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The testimony of John Edward Pic was taken at 10:25 a.m., on May 15, 1964, at 200 Maryland Avenue
NE., Washington, D.C., by Messrs. John Hart Ely and Albert E. Jenner, Jr., assistant counsel of the
President's Commission.
Mr. JENNER - Sergeant Pic, do you swear in your testimony you are about to give that you will tell the
truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I do.
Mr. JENNER - State your full name, please.
Mr. PIC - Staff Sergeant John Edward Pic, sir, U.S. Air Force.
Mr. JENNER - And that Pic is spelled P-i-c-?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Give me your home address.
Mr. PIC - 7306 Westville, San Antonio, Tex.
Mr. JENNER - You are a married man?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Give the full name of your wife including her married name, children, if any, ages and
names and where born.
Mr. PIC - My wife's maiden name is Margaret Dorothy Fuhrman. My eldest is John Edward Pic, Jr., 14
May, 1952. My daughter, Janet Ann Pic, 18 October 1954; James Michael Pic, 22 February 1960.
Mr. JENNER - Your wife Margaret is--she was born where?
Mr. PIC - New York City, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Her parents are native Americans as well as she?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; they are not.
Mr. JENNER - What do you know of them?
Mr. PIC - Her father died; I never met the man while we were going together. Her mother and father
were separated. Her mother was born in Hungary, I think. Her father was also, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What do you understand as to when they came to, this country?
Mr. PIC - I have never inquired. It has probably been mentioned but I have forgotten.
Mr. JENNER - Was it your impression they had been here a good many years?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; they have seven children. The eldest being in her forties, I am pretty sure.
Mr. JENNER - I see. When you met your wife she was living with her mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Where?
Mr. PIC - 325 East 92d Street, New York City.
Mr. JENNER - And you were at that time in the service?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; U.S. Coast Guard, assigned to U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Rockaway.
Mr. JENNER - How old is Mrs. Pic?
Mr. PIC - Thirty, sir. She turned 30 the 21st of December.
Mr. JENNER - Of 1963?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - She was born December 21, 1933?
Mr. PIC - It may be 22, sir; I never remember. I am giving sworn testimony, I don't want to lie about my
wife's birthday; it is either the 21st or 22d, I am pretty sure it is the 21st.
Mr. JENNER - You are stationed where at present?
Mr. PIC - I am attached to Wilford Hall, USAF Hospital, Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Tex.
Mr. JENNER - Do you--what is your particular assignment?
Mr. PIC - I am NCOIC, Special Procedures Branch, Department of Pathology, Wilford Hall Hospital. I have
had this job since the 10th of February this year, and my other ones, I had another job when I talked to
the Secret Service if you would be interested in that.
Mr. JENNER - How long have you been at Lackland?
Mr. PIC - I have been there since August 1962, sir.
Mr. JENNER - My information is you were born in New Orleans on January 17, 1932?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Why did you know he would do it and tell us the circumstances upon which you,
the facts upon which you base that observation?
Mr. PIC - He did it for the same reasons that I did it and Robert did it, I assume, to get from out and
under.
Mr. JENNER - Out and under what?
Mr. PIC - The yoke of oppression from my mother.
Mr. JENNER - Had that been a matter of discussion between you and for example, between you and
your brother Robert?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; it was just something we understood about and never discussed.
Mr. JENNER - And that would include Lee as well as your brother Robert; that is, you were all aware of
it?
Mr. PIC - I know this includes my brother Robert. Of course, when I was 18 years old I didn't discuss
things like this with Lee, who was much younger.
Mr. JENNER - Please elaborate on that. You made a general statement--Mr. PIC - OK.
Mr. JENNER - Which lawyers would call a mixed matter of conclusion and of fact and we would like to
know the circumstances in general.
Mr. PIC - OK.
Mr. JENNER - They would probably go back for a good many years and it involves a personality.
Mr. PIC - Well, why don't I start with the death of Lee's father, and I think really starting there I can tell
you more of my own feelings and so forth. I can make one statement but to bring out the circumstances
I think I should go back a little further.
Mr. JENNER - All right. I will come back to this eventually. I will start you off this way. You are the
brother of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you are also the brother of Robert?
Mr. PIC - Robert Lee Edward Oswald, Jr.
Mr. JENNER - Robert Lee Edward Oswald?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I notice in your statements that you refer to him as Robert Lee Edward Oswald. There are
some reference by others to Robert E. Lee Oswald.
Mr. PIC - Yes.
Mr. JENNER - Your stepfather is generally referred to in the record and by witnesses as Lee Oswald.
What was his full name?
Mr. PIC - To the best of my knowledge, sir, it was Robert Lee Edward Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - In any event your brother Robert was a junior.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Your brother Robert was born April 7, 1934; is that to the best of your recollection?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; to the best of my recollection.
Mr. JENNER - And your brother Lee Harvey Oswald, October 18, 1939?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Your father's name?
Mr. PIC - Edward John Pic, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You are named after him except-Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The two surnames were reversed?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I think it appears on here. Yes, sir; I think it appears on here. Yes, sir. John Pic, Jr., in
fact his name is-Mr. JENNER - Edward John Pic, Jr.
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - And your mother was Marguerite Claverie Oswald?
Mr. PIC - Claverie, Marguerite Frances.
Mr. JENNER - And your mother and father were married what date?
Mr. PIC - Eighth day of August 1929, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you are now reading from what?
Mr. PIC - The marriage certificate of Edward John Pic, Jr., and Mrs. Marguerite Frances Claverie.
Mr. JENNER - That is a marriage certificate that you, that is among your personal papers?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I am going to put an exhibit number on it. We will take a photograph of it and return the
original to you.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Mr. Reporter, would you mark that as John Pic Exhibit No. 1.
(John Pic Exhibit No. 1 was marked for identification.)
Mr. JENNER - I offer in evidence as John Pic Exhibit No. 1, a marriage certificate certified and dated
August 8, 1929, reflecting the marriage of Edward John Pic, Jr. and Miss Marguerite Frances Claverie on
the 1st day of August 1929, in Harrison County, Miss. The marriage certificate does not show the town.
Sergeant, do you have any recollection of your father?
Mr. PIC - My own father?
Mr. JENNER - Yes, sir.
Mr. PIC - No, sir, I don't.
Mr. JENNER - Do you have any recollection of ever having seen your father?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I don't.
Mr. JENNER - You were too young at the .time but you eventually became aware of the fact that your
mother, Marguerite, and your father, Edward, were divorced not long after your birth?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you become aware also of the fact that at the time of your birth that your father and
mother were separated?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - This is the first information, I take it, then, in the utterance I have just made?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That you have become aware that your mother and your father were separated at the
time of your birth?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You did learn about that?
Mr. JENNER - Well, the record shows you enrolled in William Frantz School at 3811 North Galvez on the
16th of September 1936 at which .time you were 4 1/2 years old.
Mr. PIC - Well, he wouldn't be there.
Mr. JENNER - Not at that time. He was then 2 1/2.
Do you recall transferring from William Frantz Elementary School to George Washington Elementary
School?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I do.
Mr. JENNER - Was that some time in late September or in November, perhaps of 1940.
Mr. PIC - Well, prior to that we went to another place, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Your first elementary school was William Frantz?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you attended William Frantz until when, to the best of your recollection?
Mr. PIC - I don't think I attended William Frantz after--Mr. JENNER - The death of your stepfather?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; somewhere around there. We went to a boarding school over in Gretna, La. Infant
Jesus College was the name of it, I believe, both Robert and I, and we hated the place.
Mr. JENNER - That was a very short period of time?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; because we hated the place.
Mr. JENNER - I will get to that in a moment.
Mr. PIC - I don't know whether it was before Washington or after. I think it was before Washington.
Mr. JENNER - Perhaps I can refresh your recollection this way. Your stepfather died in August of 1939.
You were then living in the house at the corner of Alvar and Galvez which you recall as Alvez and Galvez.
Do you recall that some months after the death of your father and in the following year, the late winter
or early spring, that you moved from that house?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Do you recall a physician by the name of Mancuso?
Mr. PIC - It may or may not be familiar, sir. I don't know.
Mr. JENNER - He was the doctor who delivered Lee, and also the man who rented the house in which
you had been living. Do you recall that?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You do recall leaving that house in which you had been living at the time of the death of
your stepfather?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; sometime afterward.
Mr. JENNER - Do you recall that it was a matter of months and not a matter of years?
Mr. PIC - It had to be months, sir, because I have got something else for 1940 here.
Mr. JENNER - When you moved from the house in which you had been living at the time of the death of
your stepfather, do you recall moving to 1242 Congress Street?
Mr. PIC - No, sir. I remember moving to a Bartholomew Street.
Mr. JENNER - That Bartholomew Street, I will get to that in a moment, perhaps to refresh your
recollection was a little house that your mother purchased on contract.
Mr. PIC - What, Bartholomew?
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - I remember that house.
Mr. JENNER - 1010 Bartholomew.
Mr. PIC - That could be it, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Before you moved to 1010 Bartholomew you lived, did you not, at 1242 Congress?
Mr. PIC - I don't remember, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Your mother didn't sell the Alvar Street 'house until January of 1944.
Mr. PIC - I thought it was sold the day we moved out.
Mr. JENNER - It was rented by Dr. Mancuso the day you moved out, and ultimately your mother
regained possession in January 1944, and he then purchased that house substantially
contemporaneously, in January of 1944.
Mr. PIC - Can I ask you a question?
Mr. JENNER - Yes, sir.
Mr. PIC - Being Mr. Oswald was in the insurance business, and being i was rather young, how did he
leave her, I have no idea.
Mr. JENNER - Well, I will answer that question. You tell me what you thought at the time and what your
impression now is.
Mr. PIC - Well, he didn't leave her much is what I was told.
Mr. JENNER - Was that the feeling you had at the time?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Well, he did leave a small insurance policy, and the house on Alvar, on the corner of Alvar
and Galvez, which was being purchased under contract, and that is about all.
I take it, it is your recollection, Sergeant, that when you and your mother and Robert and Lee, who was
then an infant child, just a few months old, left the house on 2109 Alvar you entered some institution.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And what is your recollection of that institution?
Mr. PIC - I believe it was in Gretna, La.
Mr. JENNER - Spell that for the reporter.
Mr. PIC - G-r-e-t-n-a, a whole bunch of little towns right across the river from New Orleans, West Wego,
and a couple of others, that was one of these, I think it was Gretna, it might be in one of that group.
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - And the name of the school was Infant Jesus College and it was a Catholic school, sir. And us
not being Catholics they lowered the boom on us.
Mr. JENNER - That would be you and your brother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you were at that time just about 8 years old. Was it before your 8th birthday or what?
Mr. PIC - I wouldn't remember that, sir.
Mr. JENNER - It was in 1940, however?
Mr. PIC - I thought it was in the end of 1939. It is either the end of 1939 or early 1940.
Mr. JENNER - Is it your recollection that-Mr. PIC - We were still living on Alvez and Galvez when we went to that school.
Mr. JENNER - Let me get at that this way. You and Robert were lodged eventually in the Bethlehem---Mr. PIC - Bethlehem Orphans Home, somewhere on St. Peters Street, New Orleans. I think this was in
1942, though, this happened.
Mr. JENNER - Evangelical Lutheran Bethlehem Orphan Asylum.
Mr. PIC - Right. That is the name.
Mr. JENNER - Known as the Bethlehem Children's Home?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And--all right, now, you entered there on the 3d of January 1942. Is that your recollection?
Mr. PIC - That is my recollection.
Mr. JENNER - The winter of 1942?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I know it was a little bit after the war was declared.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Now, taking that date, January 1942, and going back--Mr. PIC - OK.
Mr. JENNER - To the end of the school year in 1940-Mr. PIC - Well, the school in September 1940--I think I put in about a year and a half in this Washington
Elementary School after we were taken out of Infant Jesus College.
Mr. JENNER - At that time didn't you live at 1242 Congress Street in New Orleans?
Mr. PIC - Sir, if you have a map of New Orleans and show me where this is maybe I can remember, but I
don't remember anything but Bartholomew.
Mr. JENNER - For the purposes of refreshing your recollection the records of the public school system of
New Orleans reflect the following: that you were enrolled at William Frantz School located at 3811
North Galvez when you were 4 1/2 years old on September 16, 1936. You continued there thereafter
until September 5, 1940.
Mr. PIC - September 1940.
Mr. JENNER - These records would show that you were discharged from the William Frantz Elementary
School on January 2, 1940.
Mr. PIC - That is better.
Mr. JENNER - And that you reentered William Frantz on September 5, 1940, and you transferred to
George Washington Elementary School on November 12, 1940.
At the time of the transfer you lived at 1242 Congress Street. Your mother purchased the house at 1010
Bartholomew on the 5th of March 1941. And she sold it on the 16th of January 1942.
With that information, does that serve to refresh your recollection that the course of circumstances
might have been these. I will state them and then you correct me. I don't want you to take my word for
it but this is solely for the purpose of refreshing your recollection, if it does refresh your recollection.
Your stepfather died in August of 1939. In the winter of 1940, early, sometime in January 1940, your
mother took you and your brother, Robert, out of school, you were in the William Frantz Elementary
School at that time, and placed you in the Catholic school.
Mr. PIC - I think prior or right after this Catholic school there was another school which was in
downtown New Orleans. It was a day school. She would bring us there in the morning and take us home
at night. I don't remember too much. We didn't stay there very long.
Mr. JENNER - It is your definite recollection, however, that you were at the Catholic orphanage school in
the winter of 1940, which would be approximately 5 months after the death of your stepfather.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I don't make that statement. I make the statement that it is my definite recollection I
was in the Infant Jesus College School while we lived in this house on Alvez. What months these were,
sir, I don't know.
Mr. JENNER - And it is the best of your recollection at the present time that that was the school period
ending in the summer of 1940?
Mr. PIC - I think so, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What is your recollection as to the school you attended commencing the school year
September 1940? Did you return to William Frantz?
Mr. PIC - I went to George Washington--if I was there at William Frantz, I don't remember. Well, the
dates you give me it would be-Mr. JENNER - A short time?
Mr. PIC - Right. I remember George Washington.
Mr. JENNER - Were you living at home at that time?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was that 1242 Congress?
Mr. PIC - I don't know, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Would a map of New Orleans help you any?
Mr. PIC - Possible; I don't remember this Congress, I remember a green house, this was a green house I
remember. What street it was on, I don't know. But I do remember something about a green house.
Mr. JENNER - Was it in the French quarter, in the old city?
Mr. PIC - The way I remember the French quarter is down in here somewhere, and this is certainly not
the French quarter. Here is this Gretna. It may be in Algiers that Infant Jesus, one of these two, either
Gretna or Algiers. I think it was Gretna.
Mr. JENNER - Your mother said it was Algiers, and there is evidence that it was located in Algiers.
Mr. PIC - OK. sir; Algiers. I know it was across the river.
Mr. JENNER - You do have a recollection, however, of living in a house on Bartholomew?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Do you happen to remember, you don't remember now the exact address?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - It was at 1010 Bartholomew. Did you live in the 1010 Bartholomew house?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was it before or during, or when was it with respect to when you and Robert entered the
Bethlehem Orphanage?
Mr. PIC - We was living there when I went to Washington.
Mr. JENNER - George Washington Elementary School at 3810 St. Cloud?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Our records show your mother purchased the 1010 Bartholomew property in March of
1941, March 9 to be exact.
Mr. PIC - When I was at Infant Jesus College, I couldn't very well remember that Congress Street because
I probably--we wasn't living there.
Mr. JENNER - You weren't living-Mr. PIC - At home.
Mr. JENNER - No.
Mr. PIC - So, I am afraid I can't remember that Congress Street address. I remember a green house.
Mr. JENNER - A green house.
Mr. PIC - I think properly the notion store wasn't a booming business, and she had to go to work and
since we were reminded we were orphans all the time, the right place to be would be in an orphan
home.
Mr. JENNER - Your mother did remind you repeatedly that you were orphans?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That sort of thing. Would you elaborate on that, please?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir; she constantly reminded us we were orphans, that she didn't have the money to
support us in everything, and she opened a notion store to make money, and she wasn't making money,
and I remember she closed it and went to work at about the same time that we entered Bethlehem.
Mr. JENNER - In January 1942, Lee was a little over 2 years old, is that correct; he was born October
1939.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You were then 10 and your brother Robert was 8, I am talking about approximate ages
now.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I think you entered Bethlehem before your tenth birthday.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And a few months before his eighth birthday. Did Lee eventually join you at Bethlehem?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; he did. The exact date I don't remember. I know he was there for only a matter of
months. He wasn't there as long as Robert and I was.
Mr. JENNER - I show you a document I will have marked as John Pic Exhibit No. 2, please, for purposes of
identification which appears to be a Xerox reproduction of an application blank executed by Mrs.
Marguerite Oswald and related minutes for admission of Lee Oswald to the Evangelical Lutheran
Bethlehem Orphan Asylum Association, dated at New Orleans, December 26, 1942, and showing entry
of Lee Oswald into the orphanage asylum on the 26th day of December 1942.
(John Pic Exhibit No. 2 was marked for identification.)
Mr. JENNER - Sergeant, I direct your attention to the line on which appears what purports to be the
signature of "Mrs. Marguerite Oswald." You are familiar with the handwriting, are you not?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Of your mother Marguerite?
Mr. JENNER - I misspoke when I said 2 years. It would be the period from December 26, 1942, to January
29, 1944, which is 1 year and 1 month.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; that would only be a year and 1 month.
Mr. JENNER - For the record then that span of time for your brother between January 29, 1944, when he
was released, and December 26, 1942, when he entered is approximately 13 months.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That is about what you remember, isn't it?
Mr. PIC - Well, I remember it about 6 months. But I guess that is right. I know he wasn't in there a full 13
months at a clip. He was in and out of there in 13 months. At that school if your parents wanted to take
you home for a couple or 3 weeks they took you home for a couple or 3 weeks.
Mr. JENNER - And you do remember your mother did that?
Mr. PIC - Sure, I am sure he stayed at the Murrets also.
Mr. JENNER - Well, the Murrets recall that. Now, I show you an exhibit which we will identify as John Pic
Exhibit No. 4 which for purposes of identification is a Xerox duplication of a letter from Mrs. Marguerite
Oswald to the Reverend Harold of the Evangelical Lutheran Orphanage Asylum dated February 1, 1945,
addressed 4801 Victor, Dallas, Tex.
It is in longhand. Would you please examine it for the purpose of answering a question I will put to you
as to whether it is in the handwriting of your mother?
Mr. PIC - It appears to me, sir; to be her handwriting.
Mr. JENNER - I offer in evidence John Pic Exhibit No. 4.
(John Pic Exhibit No. 4 was marked for identification.)
Mr. JENNER - I have marked as John Pic Exhibit No. 5 another application for admission to Evangelical
Lutheran Bethlehem Orphan Asylum Association dated December 23, 1942, for the admission of John
Edward Pic and Robert Oswald to that orphanage, but the information on the application is confined to
John Edward Pic.
Unfortunately, Mr. Pic, this application, for some reason by oversight was not signed by your mother. Do
you remember a pastor by the name of Rev. J. H. Nau?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - At the Redeemer Lutheran Church?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - By the way, Mr. Reporter, for purposes of the record, there appears on this application the
fact that the marriage of Sergeant Pic's mother Marguerite and his father Edward John Pic, Jr. was at
Gulfport, La.
Mr. PIC - Mississippi.
Mr. JENNER - No, it says Gulfport, La. here and should have been Gulfport, Miss.?
Mr. PIC - Yes; Mississippi.
Mr. JENNER - Do you remember a pastor by the name of Reverend Scherer?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The Trinity Evangelical Church.
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Do you remember a Rev. M. R. Lecron?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Of the Redeemer Church?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - By the way, all you boys were christened in the Lutheran church, faith, were you not?
Mr. PIC - I don't know or remember if Lee was. I don't know about Lee.
Mr. JENNER - The record of the Bethlehem Children's Home show that he was baptised by the Rev. M. R.
Lecron of the Redeemer Lutheran Church. The exact date, however, is not given.
Mr. PIC - They even have his birthday wrong there.
Mr. JENNER - 1 day. They have it as the 19th whereas it was 18th. As a matter of fact, your mother on
one of her papers fixes it on the 19th.
Mr. PIC - So does one of the letters.
Mr. JENNER - I offer John Pic Exhibit No. 5 in evidence.
(John Pic Exhibit No. 5 was marked for identification.)
Mr. JENNER - We will adjourn now and reconvene at 3 o'clock. (Whereupon, at 12:25 p.m., the
proceeding was recessed.)
Mr. JENNER - And then you went along, he died about a year and a half later after he purchased it.
Take us from the time that your stepfather died and tell us your impressions of how the home life
changed; if it did change, what effect, if any, you observed that you now can recall that circumstances
had on your mother; and what kind of life you and the boys began to lead as distinguished from the life
you led while your stepfather was alive if there is any change now. I don't want to put any words in your
mouth.
Mr. PIC - Well, we were from the time of his death, placed in two boarding schools prior to Bethlehem,
this Infant Jesus, and the other one I don't recall the name of, the other one being a day school.
Mr. JENNER - Sort of a day school, your mother took you in the morning and brought you back. That is
two of the boys, not Lee?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He was almost a suckling child?
Mr. PIC - I don't remember. I don't see how he could have been there.
Now this day school was prior to Infant Jesus, it had to be. We went to Infant Jesus and out of there
back home for a year or so where we attended Washington and then into Bethlehem.
Like I said before, we were constantly reminded we were orphans and had financial difficulty.
Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, sir; when you just talked about Washington and Bethlehem you put
Washington before Bethlehem, and this morning you put Washington into Bethlehem.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; we went to Washington before Bethlehem.
Mr. JENNER - I think you will find that the record of this morning, I am pretty sure, will show a different
sequence. That is your impression, that you went into Bethlehem a few months after your stepfather
died?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; Infant Jesus.
Mr. JENNER - Infant Jesus. I see. Go ahead. You are right.
Mr. PIC - We were constantly reminded we were orphans and there were financial difficulties, and I was
rather young, I don't remember too much about this, but it was always something to do about money
problems. We kind of liked Infant Jesus, it wasn't bad at all. We had a pretty good childhood while we
lived on Bartholomew Street, there were no major problems there. And even at Bethlehem we beth,
Robert and I enjoyed Bethlehem. I mean we were all there with the kids with the same problems, same
age groups, and everything. Things for myself became worse when Lee came there, that is why I know
he wasn't there too long.
Mr. JENNER - Tell us about it?
Mr. PIC - At Bethlehem they had a ruling that if you had a younger brother or sister there and they had
bowel movements in their pants the older brothers would clean them up, and they would yank me out
of classes in school to go do this and, of course, this peered me very much, and I wasn't but 10 or 9 or
11.
Mr. JENNER - He was only 3 years old?
Mr. PIC - Yes; but I was 10. And they did quite a few things like this. If there was an older brother or
sister there they had to take care of the younger child. The people there didn't all the time.
Mr. JENNER - Was this 7-year spread as the years went on between you and Lee, did that affect your
relationship with him as distinguished from your relationship with your brother Robert who was only 2
years younger?
Mr. PIC - Well, anything I was involved in Robert always was. Lee was left out because of the age
difference. Robert and I went to all these homes together and all the schools together. Lee didn't, of
course.
Mr. JENNER - During the course of the years your companions and friends, I assume were different, that
is you and Robert on the one hand?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And Lee on the other?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - His life differed a little from yours too, didn't it, that is at the outset of this early period
your mother, except for this period at Bethlehem, when he was there, except for his being withdrawn
for a few weeks at a time, he was largely with her?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Living with her?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And did she express problems on her part with him?
Mr. PIC - Well, she referred how would she work and take care of a child and things like this, both. It
would seem that the problem with Robert and I was easier to solve than the problem with Lee.
Mr. JENNER - I interrupted you. Go ahead with your account.
Mr. PIC - Well, up until we left Bethlehem, I can only recall three places of employment for Mrs. Oswald,
one being Oswald's notion store which was 1941-42, thereabouts.
Mr. JENNER - While you had the Bethlehem house?
Mr. PIC - Sir; I don't remember Myrtle Evans that much. The name Myrtle is familiar to me. Just like this
woman that worked at Holmes for 30 years is familiar to me. Where I had seen her and different places?
Mr. JENNER - H-o-l-m-e-s?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; this is a department store in New Orleans.
Mr. JENNER - Of course you would recall the Murret family.
Mr. PIC - Yes; I recall them very good.
Mr. JENNER - There were a couple of those children about your age and Robert's, is that right?
Mr. PIC - I can only--let's see, Charles, there is Marilyn and Charles.
Mr. JENNER - Marilyn is the youngest?
Mr. PIC - Marilyn is the youngest, no. sir; Boogie is the youngest.
Mr. JENNER - B-o-o-g-i-e?
Mr. PIC - What is he doing now. I heard he was playing semipro ball.
Mr. JENNER - No. He is not doing that any more. Is Boogie John?
Mr. PIC - No. sir; I think-Mr. JENNER - One is a dentist, one is with Squibb, Gene is a seminarian.
Mr. PIC - Gene is the priest. Gene is the one who is my age or thereabouts. Boogie was closer to Robert's
age.
Mr. JENNER - She had five children?
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - Marilyn.
Mr. PIC - Joyce.
Mr. JENNER - Marilyn, Joyce, John, Gene-Mr. PIC - Charles.
Mr. JENNER - And Charles. They are all alive?
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - That was a fairly lively family, apparently all nice people.
Mr. JENNER - To help refresh your recollection, it is a fact that your mother lived with Lee at 831 Pauline
Street in 1942, and a couple present there by the name of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Roach, Thomas and
Dora Roach. They had been living on de Lessups Street in New Orleans, in the 800 block.
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And moved into 831 Pauline, or your mother moved into 831 Pauline Street with them.
There was a whole question as to who was the tenter, whether it was the Roaches or your mother?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; this I don't recall at all.
Mr. JENNER - And it wasn't long after they were there that some difficulty arose with respect to Lee and
that ended that. It was about 6 weeks or a month, 2 months. But you have no recollection of that?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. The question I asked you and which I keep interrupting in was to give me your
impressions of change, if any, with the coming of the death of your stepfather, and you were in the
course of recounting that.
Mr. PIC - Well, it struck me or it strikes me that we became lower and lower in the class structure.
Mr. JENNER - As your financial status--Mr. PIC - And our class structure, both.
Mr. JENNER - Would you elaborate on that? Your financial status went down?
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - And then you say lower in the class structure?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Tell me about that?
Mr. PIC - I would say we were in the middle classes while we lived on Alvez.
Mr. JENNER - While your father was alive?
Mr. PIC - And being we moved to Bartholomew, and being in orphan homes, I think we went to the
upper lower class, one class structure dropped, two class structures dropped, something like that.
Mr. JENNER - Were you conscious of that even as a 10-year-old?
Mr. PIC - Well, I realized that we weren't living as good as we used to, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Go ahead.
Mr. PIC - Well, once we were placed in an orphan home, and we were with our own kind, so to speak. I
had no feelings whatsoever. I mean, we enjoyed that place. They were rather Strict but we enjoyed it.
We had quite a bit of freedom even though they were strict. We would sneak out of the place at night
and do all kinds of childish things. But Robert and I enjoyed it.
Mr. JENNER - I am thinking more of your relations with your mother. Was her personality affected by the
death of your stepfather?
Mr. PIC - Probably she confided and put to me most of her problems since she didn't have a husband to
do this with, always referring to me as the oldest and things like this. When we were in Bethlehem we
didn't see that much of her.
Mr. JENNER - I see.
Mr. PIC - Maybe once every 2 weeks, that would be the most often. Maybe once in a while she would
drop around.
Mr. JENNER - While you were at Bethlehem did you visit the Murrets?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; several times, lots of times. You see the home once or twice a year, would take us to
the city park there in New Orleans. We would get on the rides and naturally the Murrets were right
there, and so we would rent bikes for free. It was on the home and I would ride over to their house and
visit with them a while, so did Robert. Whenever we had a chance we were more than glad 'to go there.
Mr. JENNER - While at least through the Bethlehem Orphanage period your present recollection is you
accommodated to circumstances and within the limits of the circumstances your impression is that you
lived a reasonably happy life?
Mr. PIC - We enjoyed it.
Mr. JENNER - Like all children you accommodated yourself to the circumstances?
Mr. PIC - Yes.
Mr. JENNER - Well, I think probably a good new start off point is Mr. Ekdahl. Tell us your recollection of
him, what led up, your present recollection of the circumstances which brought him into your lives and
when you first were aware of his existence and what your circumstance was at that time, what your
mother's was?
Mr. PIC - Okay.
Mr. JENNER - Give times as best you can.
Mr. PIC - If you can date for me when I had my appendix out I can practically date for you Mr. Ekdahl's.
Mr. JENNER - I am afraid I can't. Were you at Bethlehem Orphanage?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I was at Bethlehem so it would be either 1943 or 1944, and I am sure she was at Pittsburgh
at that time.
Mr. JENNER - Pittsburgh Plate?
Mr. PIC - Right. And it was right after I had my appendix out that he appeared on the scene. And she
visited us more often when she was going with him.
Mr. JENNER - And she brought him with her, did she?
Mr. PIC - Yes; he had the car.
Mr. JENNER - By the way, did your mother have an automobile during this period following your
stepfather's death?
Mr. PIC - I don't think so, sir.
Mr. JENNER - But Mr. Ekdahl did have an automobile?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; he had a 1938 Buick.
Mr. JENNER - And your mother visited you more often?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - And they on weekends took us to Covington. I remember once, it may have been more.
Mr. JENNER - All right I wanted to ask you about that. While your stepfather was still alive, did you
occasionally visit Covington?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; we did.
Mr. JENNER - Covington, as I understand it, Covington, La. is sort of a summer resort area, is it not?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; it is on the it is north of New Orleans on the northern shore of Lake Pontchartrain, and
the Murrets used to go to Mandeville, which is about 30 miles closer to New Orleans than Covington
was, and we used to visit them back and forth during the summer.
Mr. JENNER - Do you recall the names of any of those people that you--whose homes you, the sumer
resort homes that you rented during the summer period?
Mr. PIC - To the best of my recollection, sir, we were in cabins at these tourist places. We were never at
anybody's home. The Murrets were, I believe, at somebody's home in Mandeville. They had a large
house there.
Mr. JENNER - Does Mrs. Benny C-o-m-m-a-n-c-e, is that name familiar to you?
Mr. JENNER - A man of at least, apparently of considerably better means than your mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Than you boys had been accustomed to?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What about his health, what did you understand as to that?
Mr. PIC - I have no recollection of knowing anything about his health at that time, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I see. When you were taken from Bethlehem Orphanage in June of 1944, where did you
go?
Mr. PIC - Dallas, Tex., sir.
Mr. JENNER - And do you recall where you lived in Dallas, Tex.?
Mr. PIC - I remember what the house looks like, sir. I don't remember the address. You can probably
refresh me on that.
Mr. JENNER - I will do so and I want to make it accurate. 4801 Victor was the address.
Mr. PIC - That sounds familiar.
Mr. JENNER - In Dallas. Would you please describe that 4801 Victor Street home?
Mr. PIC - It was white, two story.
Mr. JENNER - Frame, brick?
Mr. PIC - Frame. I think it contained four apartments, maybe only two. I am pretty sure it was four
though, two up and two down. We lived on the lower right, in boxcar-type rooms.
Mr. JENNER - What do you mean by that?
Mr. PIC - Well, railroad style, living room, bedroom, bathroom, bedroom, kitchen.
Mr. JENNER - One lined the other, you mean?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I see. With a long hallway to connect it; is that it?
Mr. PIC - The hall ran into each room as you walked by it.
Mr. JENNER - Yes; you lived there with your mother, with Lee, and with Robert?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You did, after that summer school period in the summer of 1944, enter grammar school in
Dallas?
Mr. PIC - That is right. Davy Crockett Elementary School. I entered the 7th grade and Robert entered the
5th.
Mr. JENNER - Let's see, Lee is now almost 5 years old. Did he enter Davy Crocket at that time?
Mr. PIC - To the best of my recollection, no, sir.
Mr. JENNER - At that age he would be going to kindergarten anyhow. All right, you and Robert then
entered Davy Crockett?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You continued on at Davy Crockett in the fall semester?
Mr. PIC - Just a moment.
Mr. JENNER - Yes?
Mr. PIC - This house we went to in Dallas.
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - My mother owned it and rented the rest of it or she owned one side of it.
Mr. JENNER - It was a duplex?
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - Myrtle Evans testified that she recalled visiting you, the family, on a trip she made to
Dallas on one occasion, on a buying trip or something or accompanied a friend of hers, it was on a ladies'
apparel buying trip and she remembered it as what she called them, two-place houses. To me they are
duplexes.
Mr. PIC - Right; duplex.
Mr. JENNER - So her recollection is fairly good then. Does that affect your recollection that it was a fourapartment building rather than it was a two-apartment building?
Mr. PIC - I am pretty sure it was four apartments.
Mr. JENNER - Okay; go ahead.
Mr. PIC - Well, I was under the impression and always have been that she owned the house, and there
was some arrangement with Mr. Ekdahl as to how she got it or something. She was renting to one
couple upstairs, I know; is this right?
Mr. JENNER - No circumstances that you can recall now of the possible relationship between your
mother and Ekdahl that might have led to her seeking to do this?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - She says in her letter she is thinking in terms of returning you to Bethlehem because she is
going to be traveling with her husband when she does marry him--that is Mr. Ekdahl. There was no
discussion in your presence that you can recall on that subject?
Mr. PIC - Not returning to Bethlehem, no, sir; not that I remember. I have to find Victor Street and from
there I can just about guess where the school was. I am lost on this map. I can't find Victor Street and
where I lived.
Mr. JENNER - Was Davy Crockett Grammar School near your home at 4801 Victor Street?
Mr. PIC - About three blocks, sir. Three long blocks.
Mr. JENNER - Describe that neighborhood to us.
Mr. PIC - I think it would be middle class.
Mr. JENNER - A level up from what you had been accustomed back in New Orleans?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. There were fine brick homes; in fact, I had a paper route out there that I delivered, and
easily middle class. Maybe some upper middle class.
Mr. JENNER - Was your life there pleasant?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And when Mr. Ekdahl moved in were the relationships generally among all, now five of
you, pleasant?
Mr. PIC - Between Mr. Ekdahl and the three boys they were pleasant, sir. I think there were some
arguments between Mr. Ekdahl and my mother from time to time.
Mr. JENNER - You were aware of those?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. I am going to need a map with a listing of the schools. This one doesn't seem to have
one. This summer school was about a good 2 miles away. We walked it in the morning.
Mr. JENNER - You and Robert?
Mr. PIC - I think me and Robert. We had other friends that we went to school with.
Mr. JENNER - Of course.
Mr. PIC - And there were always a group of us. I don't remember if Robert went or not, sir, to tell you
the truth.
Mr. JENNER - I see. When you came around to the fall of 1945, however, you entered the ChamberlainHunt Military Academy?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; in fact, the trip to Chamberlain-Hunt was a side trip because Mr. Ekdahl, my mother,
and Lee were on their way to Boston to visit his folks.
And so they dropped us off at the school and then proceeded to Boston.
Mr. JENNER - Was that a motor trip?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; it was in a 1938 Buick.
Mr. JENNER - You remained at Chamberlain-Hunt Military Academy except for summer vacation, or
something of that nature, for how long?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir, you Just want a blanket statement. I have got a whole bunch of goodies while I was at
Chamberlain-Hunt.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Go ahead.
Mr. PIC - During Christmas vacation of 1945 Robert and I received money to go home for the Christmas
holidays. We were to take the train from Vicksburg, Miss., to Shreveport, La. These were instructions
and when we arrived at Shreveport, we were to wait for Mr. Ekdahl to pick us up. We arrived and he
wasn't there. So I think we waited around, I have an estimate of between 1 and 2 hours, and then he
showed up. He then drove us to Fort Worth, Benbrook, Tex., and we had a house about 15 miles below
Fort Worth in Benbrook, it was way out. It wasn't the same Benbrook house, it was further. This was a
brick house.
Mr. JENNER - The first house in Benbrook?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Had you known the family had moved to Benbrook, Tex.?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; because we was writing.
Mr. JENNER - Because of correspondence?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - This was your first view of that house?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Tell us what it was; describe it to us?
Mr. PIC - It was rather isolated on one of the main highways. In fact, I just drove that way recently and I
couldn't find the place. When I went up to Fort Worth in 1962 I was looking for the house, I couldn't find
it.
Mr. JENNER - Was it Granbury Road, Box 567, Benbrook, Tex.?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that sounds familiar. This was a brick house, with quite a bit of ground. I think way
back they told us that one of the Roosevelt sons had a house out there, that is how I remember. We
arrived there sometime the next day or two; my mother quizzed us on why we were so late. One reason
we were late besides the wait was the heavy fog, and I informed her we had to wait a while for Mr.
Ekdahl, and she kind of hinted to me, I think I was 15 at the time, did I see another woman-or was there
anything shady about it or something. That is all I have to say about that. She was under the impression
years later, she told me that he had met some woman in Shreveport and they were having some fun.
Mr. JENNER - You were in Benbrook, Tex., then for the Christmas holiday?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You and Robert?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Lee was living with Mr. Ekdahl and your mother at the Benbrook, Tex., home out on the
outskirts of Fort Worth; I guess this is-Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that is correct.
Mr. JENNER - And you returned after the Christmas holiday to-Mr. PIC - It would be January 1946 we returned to, back to Chamberlain-Hunt.
Mr. JENNER - Did you return home at all from then on until the summer of 1946?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Where were you during the summer of 1946?
Mr. PIC - In the summer of 1946, Robert and I were informed that we would stay at the academy to
attend summer session there. Well, school let out in May and I think summer session starts in June, so
there was a waiting period of about 2 to 3 weeks, so we just stayed there. This suited us fine. We really
liked the school.
Sometime during that waiting period my mother showed up and informed us that her and Mr. Ekdahl
had separated, and she showed up with Lee, of course, and she was going to take us to Covington where
we would stay the summer. We had--the commandant of the school was an attorney, and I think she got
some legal assistance from him about divorce proceeding or something. She talked to him about it, I
know. His name was Farrell, Herbert D. Farrell. He was commandant of the school. Did you ever talk to
him?
Mr. JENNER - Not that I know of.
Mr. PIC - A real nice man, too. She had the car.
Mr. JENNER - The 1938 Buick?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. She had it.
Mr. JENNER - Had she taken a home or a house in Covington?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. When we arrived there she looked for a house, and there always is one neighborhood
two or three blocks from the downtown area that we stayed in during the summers and she took a
house in this area. That address I don't remember.
Mr. JENNER - Does the address, the street Vermont Street refresh your recollection, 311 Vermont?
Mr. PIC - The only thing I remember about the house is a lady next door was plagued by squirrels
throwing nuts on her roof because she was out every morning chasing them with a broom.
Mr. JENNER - The squirrels?
Mr. PIC - The squirrels. This was a one-story brick house, and we lived on the right side.
Mr. JENNER - You stayed there throughout the summer?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you return to Chamberlain-Hunt that fall?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; we returned to Chamberlain-Hunt in September 1946. Then for the Christmas holidays,
1946, 1947, we returned to Covington where she and Lee still were, and spent those holidays there.
During those holidays we made one trip to New Orleans with this other boy who lived in Covington also
that we went to school with, and they were driving to New Orleans so we all bummed a fide and went to
New Orleans and visited the Murrets a day or so. I think it was 1 day.
Mr. JENNER - Did your mother accompany you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Had Lee entered grammar school at this time?
Mr. PIC - I wouldn't know, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Our records show that he entered--
I don't remember my testimony completely. I dc remember that my mother had made the statement
that if Mr. Ekdahl ever hit her again that she would send me in there to beat him up or, something which
I doubt that I could have done.
I was told by her that she was contesting the divorce so that he would still support her. She lost, he won.
The divorce was granted. I was also told that there was a settlement of about $1,200 and she stated that
just about all of this went to the lawyer. Right after this is when she purchased the house in Ben-brook,
Tex., the little house.
Mr. JENNER - Describe that house.
Mr. PIC - It was an L--shaped house, sir, being the top of the L was her bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, and
living room with a screened-in porch. She and Lee slept together. My brother and I slept in the living
room in the screened-in porch on studio couches. When we moved into this house and after the divorce
and everything became final, I was-Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, was that 101 San Saba?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I don't know nothing about 101 San Saba.
Mr. JENNER - Do you recall the street you were on in Benbrook; this first house?
Mr. PIC - There were no streets. We used a post office box number up at the post office there. Because I
was sending away for stamps at the time from different companies, and I was collecting stamps and I
would go pick up the mail at the post office.
Mr. JENNER - The first house in Benbrook was on Granbury Road, that is your recollection? That is the
one you have already mentioned heretofore?
Mr. PIC - Granbury Road is familiar, sir, if that is the one that is way far south of town on Granbury Road,
then that is it.
Mr. JENNER - Well, there is a letter in the file at the Hunt Military Academy in October of 1945 informing
them that a new address would be Granbury Road, Route 5, Box 567 in Benbrook.
Mr. PIC - That is the one further south of Fort Worth.
Mr. JENNER - That is the first one?
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - The house you are now mentioning in Benbrook was the summer of 1948 is different from
the first one?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; it is.
Mr. JENNER - You can't remember the street address?
Mr. PIC - There was no street address. This was the first and only house built there.
Mr. JENNER - I see.
Mr. PIC - They just built up this area and she got the very first house. Two pictures there, Lee and Lee's
dog and this is taken at the house in Benbrook, that house.
Mr. JENNER - Would you select those, please?
Mr. PIC - These were taken in Covington.
Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, the witness has referred to two pictures marked John Pic Exhibits Nos. 50 and
51. Those were taken when?
Mr. PIC - After the divorce she bought the house in Benbrook, Tex., and then she was either working at
or just got the job at Leonard Bros., Fort Worth, department store, Fort Worth, Tex.
At this time Robert and I were informed that we would not return to Chamberlain-Hunt in the fall. This, I
think, was the first time that I actually recall any hostility towards my mother.
Mr. JENNER - On your part?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; this was quite a blow to me because we did want to go back. I had 2 more years in high
school and I was going to be in the 11th grade and I did want to finish there.
Mr. JENNER - How did Robert react to that?
Mr. PIC - He felt the same way, sir. He wanted to go back. But we were informed because of the
monetary situation it would be impossible for us to go back. In fact, my mother informed me that the
best thing for me to do was not return to school but to get a job and help the family supplement its
income.
Mr. JENNER - That is withdraw from school entirely?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I was 16 at this time. In September, Lee and Robert returned to school, and I went to
work. I obtained a job at Everybody's Department Store which belonged to Leonard Bros. I was a shoe
stock boy at the salary of $25 a week.
Mr. JENNER - Did you pay some of that money to your mother?
Mr. PIC - I think at least $15 out of every pay check I did.
Mr. JENNER - $15 a week?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I think my take-home pay was $22.50 after taxes. Which left me $7.50 to ride back and
forth on the bus with.
Mr. JENNER - Did you continue to live in this home in Benbrook?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; about the same time that I went to work and Lee and Robert returned to school is
when my mother bought the house at 7408 Ewing.
Mr. JENNER - In Fort Worth?
Mr. PIC - That is right, sir. It was just impossible for her and I to go to work and leave them out in the
sticks, but being we moved an Ewing they could walk to school. In fact, I left for work earlier than she
did, a couple of hours, in fact.
Mr. JENNER - Had Lee attended school in Benbrook, Tex.?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; not in the little house because we moved in the summer and moved out in the early
fall.
Mr. JENNER - Had he attended a day school or a nursery school in Benbrook, Tex., at anytime to your
knowledge over this period of years?
Mr. PIC - During the summer, sir, my mother worked at Leonard Bros., the three boys were left alone at
home.
Mr. JENNER - What about the previous years?
Mr. PIC - She didn't work the previous years. She was still married to Mr. Ekdahl.
Mr. JENNER - I appreciate that I wonder if he went to nursery school--when you first went to Benbrook,
Tex., when you were on Granbury Road?
Mr. PIC - I wouldn't know that, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You have no impression?
Mr. PIC - That I don't remember.
Mr. JENNER - All right. You now started to work in the fall of 1948.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The family moves into Fort Worth at 7408 Ewing Street.
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And Lee and Robert enter school in Fort Worth.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Is that correct? Do you remember the school, one would be a grammar school and one a
Junior high school.
Mr. PIC - I think Robert went to Sterling Junior High School. In fact, she would drive him there in the
morning, and Lee was going to Ridglea, West Ridglea Elementary School, something like that.
Mr. JENNER - What happened to Lee? You were working.
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - Robert was in school.
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - And Lee was in school.
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - Did Robert come home from school to take care of Lee when he finished?
Mr. PIC - Lee returned home before Robert did, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What did he do?
Mr. PIC - I have no idea, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Your mother was at work?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He would just come home and wait until somebody came home?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; there was no TV at that time
Mr. JENNER - Was he what about his habits in that respect? Did--your mother taught him to return
home immediately and to stay in the house until she arrived?
Mr. PIC - I am sure he always did, sir, knowing his personality. He was not the type to goof off in things
like this.
Mr. JENNER - Did you notice any tendencies on his part to do heavy reading at this stage of his life?
Mr. PIC - He always read a lot, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He did?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What about his--was he gregarious or not? Did he exhibit tendencies to be with other
people and children in the neighborhood or the contrary?
Mr. PIC - Not to much, sir. There weren't that many children his age in the neighborhood. In fact, most
of them were my age and my brother Robert's.
Mr. JENNER - Did this age gap between you and Lee and between Lee and your brother Robert affect
your relationships with him now that you had reached the age you were now 16, Robert was 14, and Lee
was 9.
Mr. PIC - We played with Lee. Lee had his dog. On the weekends, Sunday, we would all go to the movies,
the whole family. I usually went to work at sunup and returned at dark myself.
In the fall of 1948 it was the fad among high school students and young teenagers to join either the
National Guard or Naval Reserve or some reserve outfit like this, so I was only 16 at the time, and I
wanted to do this, and my mother thought it would be a real good way to supplement the income. So-Mr. JENNER - Did you get paid for this service?
Mr. PIC - Yes. sir we would meet once a month and draw a day's salary, something like this. It wasn't
much money, a couple or $3 a meeting; something like that. So we went to the notary, I think, this was
McLean's office and she swore to a notary that I was 17.
Mr. JENNER - But you were not in fact 17?
Mr. PIC - No. sir: I was 16. She gave my birthday as 17 January 1931. Can we go off the record?
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. PIC - OK so I joined the Marine Corps Reserve sometime in October 1948. I was attached to the 2d
l55th Military Howitzer Battalion, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Fort Worth, Tex. About that time I started
thinking and decided regardless of how my mother felt what happened, I was going to go back to school
So in January 1949 I went back to school and finished my high, school education.
Mr. JENNER - To what school did you return?
Mr. PIC - I attended Arlington Heights High School, sir.
Mr. JENNER - In Fort Worth?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you work after school ? Did you do anything to supplement your income?
Mr. PIC - I was able to retain my job at Everybody's as a stock boy for about 1 month on this part-time
basis but at the end of February they informed me there was no. way I could be kept on a part-time
basis so I left the job and I then got a job at Burt's shoestore. At Burt's shoestore I was working part time
but really making more than full time because I was a stock boy at $15 and all the commissions I could
make in their stockroom plus all day Saturday.
Mr. JENNER - Selling shoes?
Mr. PIC - Yes sir.
Mr. JENNER - What was your mother doing at this time?
Mr. PIC - I believe at this time. sir, she was working at Sterling's Department Store in Fort Worth after
leaving Leonard Bros., before I left Everybody's, I think.
Mr. JENNER - Was Robert working after school?
Mr. PIC - Yes: he was working at the A & P.
Mr. JENNER - Had he been working at the A & P after school from the previous fall?
Mr. PIC - This would be 1949. February 1949, and I am sure he was working at A & P and going to school
at that time, some time during that period. He and I were both working and going to school, both.
So, in January 1949. I returned to high school, Arlington Heights High School, Fort Worth Tex and was a
junior, 11th grade there.
The school session ended and then I attended summer school to make up for what I had lost at Paschal
High School, Fort Worth, Tex.
Mr. JENNER - P-a-s-k-a-l?
Mr. PIC - P-a-s-c-h-a-l. sir; is the way they spell it, sir. I still had the job at Burt's. So I attended summer
school at Paschal, the summer of 1949. September of 1949-Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, what did Lee do now? Had he been in school in the fall and winter of 1948 and
the winter and spring of 1949?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right Now, vacation is here. What did he do during the summer? You went to school, ad
you worked at Burt's, what was he doing?
Mr. PIC - Playing around home. And going to this Camp Carter that we ran across in the letter, I guess, I
don't remember.
Mr. JENNER - What was Robert doing during the summer?
Mr. PIC - He was working at the A & P, sir; I believe.
Mr. JENNER - Were both of you boys contributing to the support of your mother during this period?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Both of you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Were you continuing to give your mother the $15 a week you had started to give her in
the fall of 1948?
Mr. PIC - Well, as far as I am concerned, being that I had no set income, worked on a guaranteed salary
of $15 plus commissions my pay might fluctuate between $20, $35 a week depending on how good a
week I had. And I prorated this accordingly with her.
Mr. JENNER - And was Robert contributing something as well?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; he was.
Mr. JENNER - Lee didn't work at any time?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you ever recall Lee up through this time through the summer of 1949 doing any work?
Mr. PIC - No.
Mr. JENNER - He is now 10 years old?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He didn't have any paper routes or do the things that a 10-year-old sometimes does?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - We have now reached the fall of 1949.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; September 1949, I decided--well, let's go back to when I went back to high school.
Mr. JENNER - All right. It Is January of 1949.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Lee was at Ridglea.
Mr. PIC - OK. I figured since I was smart enough to decide to go back to high school and my mother tried
to talk me out of it I felt it was my own doing and therefore it was my own responsibility, so I decided
since that is the way she felt and that was the way I felt I would sign my own report cards and take care
of my own notes and everything.
My hostility towards her increased at this time because she pushed me to work and make money, and I
knew an education, as much as I could get would be the best thing for me.
Since I took on the responsibility of going back to school I figured I could take care of the rest of it and I
wanted nothing from her in this regard. This I did. I signed my own report card, wrote my own notes
when I played hooky and missed school.
Mr. JENNER - Signing her name?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; so in.
Mr. JENNER - By the way what kind of a student were you?
Mr. PIC - I was a pretty good student at Chamberlain-Hunt. I had an A-B average at Chamberlain-Hunt, I
believe, I did not do too good in the public schools, it was a little bit different, in Chamberlain-Hunt. The
classes being a little larger, no individualized concern, just mass teaching. This was a little hard for me to
adjust to. I did, I think I had a B or C average at Arlington Heights.
My summer school session, I think I maintained a B-C average. Maybe an A in one subject. So that in the
1949, the summer of 1949, I went to Paschal High School for the summer session, and I decided at this
time that I liked Paschal better than Arlington Heights, so I fixed up my own transfer papers and I
transferred to Paschal High School in the fall of 1949, which I did enjoy the school better.
Arlington Heights was rather a snobbish school, the rich kids went there and everything, and being I was
enrolled in what was called distributive education which means you go to school and work part time you
are kind of looked down upon in these type schools. But in Paschal it wasn't that way. The kids weren't
snobbish and they weren't so high class, the majority of them.
I didn't do too good that particular year. I was working pretty hard, and I think I flunked one subject. So
right after the Christmas holidays 1949, I was coming towards my 18th birthday and I decided I had just
about finished school and I would be graduated, if I passed everything I would, and I decided to join the
service, the Coast Guard, and then I processed my paper work, and 3 days prior to graduation I quit
school and joined the Coast Guard.
At this time to get in the Coast Guard was rather hard to do. You had to get on a waiting list and when
they called you and you didn't show up for it you didn't get in maybe for 6 months or so. I joined the
Coast Guard because it was the hardest service to get into. I wasn't interested in the Army or the Marine
Corps or the Navy. I took the one that was hardest, the hardest requirement and I got into it.
So, in January, approximately 25 January 1950 I joined the Coast Guard, and left for Cape May, N.J. I did
not see Robert, Lee, or my mother until October 1950, 9 months later.
Mr. JENNER - October of 1959?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; 1950. 1950.
Mr. JENNER - Before we get to that or probe that any further, Lee returned to school in the fall of 1949?
Mr. PIC - That is right.
Mr. JENNER - He was still at Ridglea Elementary, then?
Mr. PIC - As far as I know, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What was his general attitude and his activities during this period 1948, 1949, through the
summer of 1949.
Mr. PIC - Sir; I was 17 years old, I wasn't interested in what an 8- 9-year old kids activities were in school.
I mean I had girls on my mind and other things like that, you know.
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - To be honest with you.
Mr. JENNER - Yes, of course. What was your impression of him at that time?
Mr. PIC - He would get into his trouble, and maybe he would have trouble with a neighbor now and then
about walking across their lawn or something. I remember once there was a fight on the bus because of
Lee that my brother Robert got beat up because. Robert probably would remember that better than I
did.
Mr. JENNER - I don't know whether he mentioned that.
Mr. PIC - I know he got his rear end whipped because of Lee.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
You entered the Coast Guard, and then you didn't see either of your brothers or your mother from the
time of your enlistment in January of 1950.
Mr. PIC - That is right.
Mr. JENNER - Until when?
Mr. PIC - October 1950, sir. Early October 1950.
Mr. JENNER - What was that occasion?
Mr. PIC - I went back home on leave, back to Fort Worth on leave, sir.
Mr. JENNER - How long were you home on leave?
Mr. PIC - I think I took 20 days' leave. I think I stayed there 15, 16, something like that, about 2 weeks.
Mr. JENNER - What was the general atmosphere around the house at that time?
Mr. PIC - Well, everybody was glad to see me. I was--well, I come home with a couple of hundred
dollars, you know a sailor off the high seas always saves his money and the mother right away wanted to
hold it for me and so she conned me into that, and she let me have a few dollars of my own.
Then I spent most of my time looking up old girl friends and things, and visiting Mr. Conway. He and I
were always playing chess together.
Mr. JENNER - Mr. Conway, I took his deposition.
Mr. PIC - Yes, very nice man.
Mr. JENNER - He spoke of playing chess with you a great deal.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I had forgotten that. Lived across the street.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; about five doors, four doors to the right of us.
Mr. JENNER - Apart from that you were aware of the fact your father was making contributions?
Mr. PIC - Right. She reminded me the day I became 18 that the payments stopped right then and there.
Mr. JENNER - The fact is that they did.
Mr. PIC - I know. I have no reason to doubt that. What was the amount?
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. JENNER - When you were in the service did you make any allotment to your mother?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you send her any money at any time while you were in the service?
Mr. PIC - Quite frequently, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Tell us about that. Tell us as best you can the amount.
Mr. PIC - When I was in boot camp from January 1950 to May 1950, the only amount they paid us was
$15 every 2 weeks and they held back the rest of our pay until we would graduate and then we would
have money to go to our next station with. They do this to recruits. I don't remember if I sent any of this
15 or not, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you send any of the excess when you got it?
Mr. PIC - In those letters I presented you could add them up and see how much I sent in the year 1950. I
think I sent $10, $20 at a time when I had it. I was making $80 a month. How much could I send and still
be a sailor?
Mr. JENNER - This is not in any sense a criticism, sergeant. All I am doing is seeking some facts.
Mr. PIC - Well, sir, in the letters she refers to 10, 20, 40, sometimes.
Mr. JENNER - I show you John Pic Exhibits Nos. 48 and 59, and referring to No. 48, at the bottom of
which is written Lee, age 2 1/2. Would you identify that, please?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; this is Lee Harvey Oswald age 2 1/2 as the picture states written in the handwriting of
Mrs. Marguerite Oswald. This picture was taken at Lillian Murret's at Sherwood Forest Drive.
Mr. JENNER - That was your aunt's home in Sherwood Forest, New Orleans.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I am sure of that.
Mr. JENNER - I show you John Pic Exhibit No. 49 which--would you identify that?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; this is a picture of Lee Harvey Oswald, I guess at the same time, with a dog, and I am
sure this was taken at Lillian Murret's in Sherwood Forest Drive.
Mr. JENNER - At the same time that John Pic Exhibit No. 48 was taken?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I think so.
Mr. JENNER - All right. I hand you now John Pic Exhibit No. 56, a photograph of a young man. Would you
identify that as to time and place if you can, and age, his age, the subject's age?
Mr. PIC - Sir, this is a picture of Lee Harvey Oswald which I believe to have been taken when he was in
about the second or third grade.
Mr. JENNER - That would be when you were living in Dallas?
Mr. PIC - Fort Worth, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Fort Worth, yes; 7408 Ewing.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I hand you John Pic Exhibits Nos. 57 and 58. I don't know which depicts this young man at
the younger age. Take the younger one.
Mr. PIC - Exhibit No. 57, sir, I believe was taken either in late 1951 or early 1952, and it shows a picture
of Lee Harvey Oswald approximately how he looked when he came to New York to stay with my wife
and I in August of 1952.
Exhibit No. 58, to my best recollection, I think, is a picture sent to me by my mother in approximately
1954, 1955, maybe in 1956, from New Orleans, La. It is a picture of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - It is after they returned to New Orleans?
Mr. PIC - I am pretty sure that picture was taken in New Orleans.
Mr. JENNER - All right. I offer in evidence John Pic Exhibits Nos. 48, 49, 56, 57, and 58.
(John Pic Exhibits Nos. 48, 49, 56, 57, and 58 were marked for identification.)
Mr. JENNER - What were the circumstances surrounding and leading up to your mother and Lee coming
to New York City in the summer of 1952?
Mr. PIC - I think this was brought on because Robert joined the service sometime previous to that. That
would be about right, April 1952, did he join the service. I don't know when. He wasn't there at the time.
He was in the service when they came.
Mr. JENNER - Yes. He entered the service as soon as he reached his majority.
Mr. PIC - So that would be April 1952.
Mr. JENNER - Was there an incident respecting, between Robert and your mother and some young lady
in which, in whom he was interested just before he entered the service?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You came to know about that?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - By what means?
Mr. PIC - By way of my mother, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right, what was it?
Mr. PIC - Robert had been seeing this girl and she had a club foot. My mother didn't feel that they
should be married. He wanted to marry her, and she conned him out of it.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Had you received any letters from Robert on that subject at anytime?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Between the time you were home in October of 1950 and the summer of 1952, had you
seen your mother or either of your brothers?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Now, my question to you was what led up to and what were the circumstances
involving or surrounding the visit of your mother and Lee to New York in the summer of 1952.
Mr. PIC - Well, Robert had joined the service in April 1952. It was the summer months, so Lee was not in
school, and the trip to New York was feasible, being Lee would have no schooltime lost, it was my
impression and also my wife's--meanwhile, I was married, you know, if you are interested in this.
Mr. JENNER - Yes; I am.
Mr. PIC - August 18, 1951, I married my wife Margaret Dorothy Fuhrman.
Mr. JENNER - You had met her after you had entered the service and while you were stationed in the
New York area?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - At this time, that is the summer of 1952 you were living where?
Mr. PIC - 325 East 92d Street, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you have any children at that time?
Mr. JENNER - I misunderstood you, I thought you said you took Lee but you said you took leave.
Mr. PIC - Leave.
Mr. JENNER - You took 30 days leave.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; maybe a week or two.
Mr. JENNER - What was your impression, you were with them or tried to be with them during that 2week period.
Mr. PIC - Just a minute, sir. That is where I began my notes. August 1952, my mother and Lee came to
New York. They brought with them quite a bit of luggage, and their own TV set. On my way home I had
to walk about 8 to 10 blocks to the subway, and Lee walked up to meet me as I was walking home, I told
my wife and Lee decided to go up and meet me. We met in the street and I was real glad to see him and
he was real glad to see me. 'We were real good friends. I think a matter of a few days or so I took my
leave. Lee and I visited some of the landmarks of New York, the Museum of Natural History, Polk's
Hobby Shop on 5th Avenue. I took him on the Staten Island ferry, and several other excursions we made.
Mr. JENNER - Go ahead.
Mr. PIC - Well, sir; it wasn't but a matter of days before I could sense they moved in to stay for good,
and this not being my apartment, but my mother-in-law's apartment, my wife kind of frowned upon this
a little bit. We didn't really mind as long as my mother-in-law wasn't there, but she was due back in a
matter of a month or so.
During my leave I was under the impression that I may get out of the service in January of 1953, when
my enlistment was up, so I went around to several colleges. My mother drove me to these colleges,
Fordham University, for one, and Brooklyn, some college in Brooklyn, a couple of other ones I inquired
about. I remember one conversation in the car that she reminded me that even though Margy was my
wife, she wasn't quite as good as I was, and things like this. She didn't say too many good things about
my wife. Well, naturally, I resented this, because I put my wife before my mother any day.
Things were pretty good during the time I was on leave. When I went back to work I would come home
my wife would tell me about some little problem they would have. The first problem that I recollect was
that there was no support for the grocery bill whatsoever. I don't think I was making more than $150 a
month, and they were eating up quite a bit, and I just casually mentioned that and my mother got very
much upset about it. So every night I got home and especially the nights I was away and I would come
home the next day my wife would have more to tell me about the little arguments. It seems it is my
wife's impression that whenever there was an argument that my mother antagonized Lee towards
hostility against my wife.
My wife liked Lee. My wife and I had talked several times that it would be nice if Lee would stay with us
alone, and we wouldn't mind having him But we never bothered mentioning this because we knew it
was an impossibility.
It got toward schooltime and they had their foothold in the house and he was going to enroll in the
neighborhood school, and they planned to stay with us, and I didn't much like this. We couldn't afford to
have them, and took him up to enroll in this school.
Mr. JENNER - You did?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; my mother did. I think this is a public school in New York City located on about 89th,
90th Street between Third Avenue and Second Avenue. Lee didn't like this school. I didn't much blame
him.
Mr. ELY - When you visited these colleges, had you received credit for finishing high school somehow?
Mr. PIC - No.
Mr. JENNER - Did you hear anything to the effect that the reason why your mother and Lee had come to
New York had anything to do with Lee's being given some sort of mental tests?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was there a period of time just before the enrollment of Lee in the New York Public
School, that he attended for about a month a Lutheran denominational school?
Mr. PIC - I don't know, sir. I am not up to that yet.
Mr. JENNER - I see. All right.
Mr. PIC - At about the same time that Lee was enrolled in school that we had the big trouble. It seems
that there was an argument about the TV set one day, and--between my wife and my mother. It seems
that according to my wife's statement that my mother antagonized Lee, being very hostile toward my
wife and he pulled out a pocketknife and said that if she made any attempt to do anything about it that
he would use it on her, at the same time Lee struck his mother. This perturbed my wife to no end. So, I
came home that night, and the facts were related to me.
Mr. JENNER - When the facts were related to you was your mother present, Lee present, your wife
present? If not, who was present?
Mr. PIC - I think my wife told me this in private, sir. I went and asked my mother about it.
Mr. JENNER - Your mother was home?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; she was home.
Mr. JENNER - You went and spoke with your mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was Lee present when you spoke to your mother?
Mr. JENNER - Up to this incident when this knife pulling incident occurred, how had your relations with
Lee been?
Mr. PIC - Been very good, sir. He and I had gone on all these excursions throughout New York City, and I
tried to show him what I could, and spend as much time as I could with him.
Mr. JENNER - You found him to have he was interested in that sort of thing?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; he loved to go to the Museum of Natural History, anything like that he liked.
Mr. JENNER - Did you speak to him about this relationship he appeared to have with his mother in which
he minded her or not as he saw fit and did as he wished?
Mr. PIC - Not until the knife pulling incident.
Mr. JENNER - And you did discuss that subject with him on that occasion?
Mr. PIC - I attempted to, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you attempt to do it thereafter when you saw him from time to time?
Mr. PIC - Sir, he would have nothing to do with me thereafter.
Mr. JENNER - He would not.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; he wouldn't even speak to me.
Mr. JENNER - There was an absolute, complete change then in his relations with you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that is correct.
Mr. JENNER - It was a marked one?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, I have a couple of more incidents in which I can relate that even more so.
Mr. JENNER - Would you do that?
Mr. PIC - Well, the day they moved out they had done this before I came home from work.
Mr. JENNER - They had moved out before you came home from work?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir. To elaborate, in my notes I have "after I approached Lee about this incident
his feelings toward me became hostile and thereafter remained indifferent to me and never again was I
able to communicate with him in any way."
Mr. JENNER - Sergeant, if you can, instead of just reading from your notes, read your notes, and if they
refresh your recollection and then give in your own words the facts.
Mr. PIC - Well, prior to this particular incident, I would consider us the best of friends as far as older
brother- younger brother relationship. My wife always says that he idolized me and thought quite a bit
of me.
Mr. JENNER - Up to this time, the relationship between you and your brother Lee, and your brother
Robert, all three of you, had been a cordial normal friendly relationship that you expect to exist among
brothers?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What was your nickname?
Mr. PIC - Pic.
Mr. JENNER - What was your brother Robert's nickname?
Mr. PIC - In Chamberlain-Hunt we referred to him as "Mouse". I think that hung on a while after that.
Mr. JENNER - What nickname did he have before that?
Mr. PIC - None that I recall.
Mr. JENNER - Why did he get that? Was he a quiet boy?
Mr. PIC - He was the littlest one in Chamberlain-Hunt and that was why they called him that.
Mr. JENNER - I see, size.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did Lee ever have a nickname?
Mr. PIC - Not that I know of, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You had the feeling, did you, up until this incident at least that Lee is a young boy, 7 years
younger than you, and his brother Robert 5 years older than he, and he looked up to both of you as
older brothers?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you had, both you and your brother Robert had love in your heart for your brother
Lee?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you felt he reciprocated that?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And the relationship between yourself and your brother Robert was cordial?
Mr. PIC - They always have, and still are, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I may say to you that he so testified. All right.
Mr. PIC - So they moved out in about September 1952, maybe it was late September, early October,
somewhere around there, so from about somewhere between September of 1952 and January 1953,
my brother Robert came to New York on leave, and we were all invited up to the Bronx.
Mr. JENNER - To visit whom?
Mr. PIC - Sir?
Mr. JENNER - To visit whom?
Mr. PIC - To visit my mother and my brother.
Mr. JENNER - Your brother?
Mr. PIC - That is correct.
Mr. JENNER - Did your brother's wife accompany him?
Mr. PIC - He wasn't married at that time, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He wasn't married?
Mr. PIC - I think this was, his leave was probably in October or November 1952, a matter of a month or
two after they had moved out. We visited their apartment in the Bronx.
Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, where did your brother stay?
Mr. PIC - I think he stayed at the Soldier-Sailor-Airmen Club in New York.
Mr. JENNER - In any event he did not stay with you.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; he may have stayed with my mother also. I don't think so. Maybe for a night or two.
We went out, my wife fixed him up with a date with one of her girl friends and we went out together a
couple of times. So, we were invited up there for this Sunday dinner. So it was my mother, Lee, Robert,
my wife, myself, and my son.
Robert was already there when we arrived. When Lee seen me or my wife he left the room. For dinner
he sat in the front room watching TV and didn't join us whatsoever.
Mr. JENNER - He did not join you for dinner?
Mr. PIC - No, sir. Didn't speak to me or my wife.
Mr. JENNER - That put a kind of pall on the visit, did it not?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you--he didn't speak to you. Did you attempt to speak with him?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I did.
Mr. JENNER - Did he answer you?
Mr. PIC - He shrugged his shoulders a couple of times maybe. He wasn't interested in anything I had to
say.
Mr. JENNER - He was definitely hostile to you and to Mrs. Pic?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And that continued throughout the entire visit that evening or was it an evening?
Mr. PIC - It was early afternoon until dusk. We did have an infant son we had to get home.
Mr. JENNER - Was it a Sunday or Saturday?
Mr. PIC - I am sure it was a Sunday. In January 1950-Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, what did you observe with respect to the attitude of Lee toward his mother on
that occasion?
Mr. PIC - When he was eating he came and got what he wanted, picked up his plate, went to the living
room and watched TV. He decided what he wanted to eat and maybe she helped him. I don't really
remember too much about it. I know he did not eat with us.
Mr. JENNER - Did you notice his relation, if any, with Robert?
Mr. PIC - From what I was told later and so forth when I wasn't present him and Robert got along real
good.
Mr. JENNER - Excuse me. My question was did you observe on this occasion.
Mr. PIC - There was nothing to observe while I was present, sir. He was completely withdrawn from the
crowd.
Mr. JENNER - He withdrew from everybody?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - Personally, I didn't know if he was more hostile towards me or my wife. I still don't know this
fact. Maybe it was her, maybe it was me, maybe it was both of us.
In January 1953, I did reenlist in the Coast Guard. I decided to stay in rather than quit, and so forth.
Mr. JENNER - From the time of that October visit of Robert to January 1953, did you see Lee at any time
during that period?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I did not. I seen my mother on several occasions. She was working on 42d Street in a
Lerner's Dress Shop. I guess I would see her maybe once every 3 weeks to once a month, we dropped
downtown, my wife and I, to see her.
Mr. JENNER - What did she say about Lee during that time when you saw her on those occasions?
Mr. PIC - Whenever I seen her, whether I was alone or with my wife, I was usually alone, I went to see
her myself, my wife didn't care to see my mother, she would complain about her financial status and
when I would ask her about how Lee was doing she would say, "OK" but would not elaborate.
Said "He is OK, but he doesn't have a brother, an older brother to talk to or no one to do anything with."
Mr. JENNER - During this period of time and up to January 1953, in any of the contacts you had with
your mother did you learn or were you advised or did you become aware that there was difficulty with
Lee with respect to truancy in attendance at school?
Mr. PIC - I am not quite there, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. The answer is, I take it, that up to this point of January 1953 you were not aware.
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Despite the fact that you had seen your mother from time to time during that period?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right, we are at January 1953, when you reenlisted in the Coast Guard.
Mr. PIC - That is right. So in February 1953, my wife and I were again invited to their apartment. This
may or may not have been the same apartment we originally visited. I don't remember, sir. I know it was
up in the Bronx. I think it may have been a different apartment. Is that right?
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - As my wife and I walked in, Lee walked out and my mother informed us that he would probably
go to the Bronx Zoo. We had Sunday dinner, and in the course of the conversation my mother informed
me that Lee was having a truancy problem and that the school officials had suggested that he might
need psychiatric aid to combat his truancy problem.
She informed me that Lee said that he would not see a head shrinker or nut doctor, and she wanted any
suggestions or opinions from me as to how to get him to see him, and I told her just take him down
there. That is all I could suggest.
Mr. JENNER - What was her response to that?
Mr. PIC - Well, Lee was still the boss. If he didn't want to go see the psychiatrist, he wasn't going.
Mr. JENNER - She had no control over him?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you were quite aware of that, were you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you discuss that with her?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; she discussed it with me. I mean she told me that she couldn't control him and so forth.
This I knew.
Mr. JENNER - Did you get the impression from anything she said to you that this truancy or this lack of
control problem had been something that had suddenly arisen or
Mr. PIC - I think it was gradual, and getting worse and worse as time went by.
Mr. JENNER - Sergeant, when you were still home and up to the time you enlisted which was in January
1950, had there been any control problems with respect to Lee? In other words, had you noticed this
problem developing, any headstrong attitudes on his part? Cudgel your mind and take yourself back.
Mr. PIC - I would say, sir, that whenever there was a disciplinary problem to be taken care of that it
wasn't enforced with Lee by his mother prior to 1950. She always reminded Robert and I that we were
the older and we should see to these things that he don't do them and so forth.
Mr. JENNER - What did you and Robert do about it?
Mr. PIC - Not much, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you speak to him? You were his older brother. He had the love and affection for you?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir; what was serious to her probably wasn't serious to a 13- and 15-year old kid or 14-16.
There was no big troubles he got into that any kid does.
Mr. JENNER - What did you notice up until the time you enlisted in January 1950, of Lee's relations with
other children in the neighborhood or his schoolmates. What was your overall impression, first?
Mr. PIC - To my best recollection, sir; there were no other children in the neighborhood of his age group
that he played consistently with. I think most of the time he went to play with other children it was a
matter of a couple, couple of blocks away or so, with his own age group.
Mr. JENNER - Was he inclined to remain in the house rather than go out and play with other children?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; he was more inclined to stay in the house than go out and play.
Mr. JENNER - Was that noticeable to you?
Mr. PIC - I wasn't there that much, sir; I was working and going to school, both. I wasn't there to observe
this.
Mr. JENNER - I see.
Mr. PIC - Except maybe on a weekend occasionally.
Mr. JENNER - But you did notice that when they came to New York in 1952, particularly in the fall of
1952, that by that time he had become quite headstrong?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And that his mother and your ,mother Marguerite, had pretty well lost any influence or
control over him?
Mr. PIC - That is absolutely true, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Now, we brought you up to enlistment in January 1953.
Mr. PIC - On the occasion when we visited them in February 1953.
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - At this same time in February 1953, I received orders to go aboard ship again, so from the time
period February 1953, until September 1953, I was in and out of New York at sea.
Mr. JENNER - Did you see either your mother or Lee during that period of time?
Mr. PIC - I did not see Lee after the February visit, sir. I had seen her on several occasions.
Mr. JENNER - During this--Mr. PIC - Downtown where she worked.
Mr. JENNER - She was still working in Lerner's in the spring and summer of 1953 or had she changed
jobs?
Mr. PIC - To my best recollection it was still Lerner's.
Mr. JENNER - Do you recall her working at a hosiery shop during this period of time rather than Lerner's?
Mr. PIC - I wouldn't remember, sir.
Mr. JENNER - She might have been but you just don't have a recollection?
Mr. PIC - Wherever she was working at the time, I mean she shifted jobs quite often and it is kind of
hard keeping track of them.
Mr. JENNER - Did she have difficulty with her employers, get along with fellow workers at these various
shops?
Mr. PIC - Whenever she changed jobs she always gave me a rationalized answer.
Mr. JENNER - Well, that is a conclusion. Tell me what it was.
Mr. PIC - I remember once, it may have been the Lerner shop or it may have been this hosiery shop
which you are referring to, that she told me that they let her go because she didn't use an underarm
deoderant. That was the reason she gave me, sir. She said she couldn't do nothing about it. She uses it
but if it don't work what can she do about it.
Other times whenever she changed jobs it was always because the next job was better.
Mr. JENNER - During the time, on the occasions when you saw her, which was relatively infrequent from
January of 1953 to, what is the next date you gave, September of 1953?
Mr. PIC - August-September 1953.
Mr. JENNER - August of 1953, September of 1953, was there any discussion with her about Lee?
Mr. PIC - When I asked about him it was the same old stuff, he is getting along better. She would tell me
that he still doesn't have anybody to confide in, things like this.
Mr. JENNER - Was there any further discussion about truancy, any possibility of care for him by a
psychiatrist?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; when I asked about this she said everything was working out fine.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - Whenever I would meet her it would be the same old song and dance, like hinting around I
should help support her which I couldn't afford to do, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You had a wife and child by that time?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What was your compensation?
Mr. JENNER - During this period of time there came about a substantially complete rupture then
between yourself and your mother?
Mr. PIC - To a certain degree.
Mr. JENNER - Did you see your brother at any time thereafter?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I did not.
Mr. JENNER - Was there an occasion in Thanksgiving 1962 when you saw him?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I can get to that. There are things happened prior to that.
Mr. JENNER - You did see him-Mr. PIC - No, sir; I did not see him. I seen my mother.
Mr. JENNER - I see. All right; go ahead.
Mr. PIC - I returned from Portsmouth, Va., in April 1954, sir: and took up residency at 80 St. Marks Place,
Staten Island, N.Y. We returned really to 325 East 92d Street, stayed there a matter of a couple of days
until I found us a place to live in Staten Island and then my wife and I moved over to Staten Island
leaving my mother-in-law in the apartment, being I felt because my wife had six brothers and sisters
that they could worry about her. I didn't see that it was my responsibility much longer. My wife was the
youngest child, and we lived there almost 2 years.
I was then assigned to the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Halfmoon, which is a weather vessel, and this is
where I am in and out for 6-, 7-week periods at a time. It was during this time that she wrote me at the
base, my mother, and informed me that they were back in New Orleans, and you have the letters
referring to this, sir.
It was either sometime in the fall of 1955 or the winter of 1956 that my mother called me from New
Orleans.
Mr. JENNER - By telephone?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; and said she wanted to visit again.
Mr. JENNER - You were then in New York?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; well, Lee was still with her, and my wife frowned upon this, and being that we did have
a one-bedroom apartment, and we did have two children at this time there was no way at all we could
accommodate two of them. She was very upset about this that I wouldn't have her up. There was
nothing I could do about it, though. I knew if she came up they were coming up to stay, and I didn't want
a repeat of what we had. So in February 1956, I joined the Air Force and was stationed at Mitchel Air
Force Base in New York which is about 30, 40 miles east of New York City. In October 1956, Lee joined
the Marine Corps.
Mr. PIC - I purchased my first one when I was stationed in Virginia. We arrived in Fort Worth,
approximately 28, 29 October 1958. I remember we were in her house on Halloween night because I
pulled the car up behind and locked the gates so I would not have my hub caps stolen.
Mr. JENNER - Where did she reside then?
Mr. PIC - I think you ought to refresh my memory on that. It was a little circle. Did she have an address
with a little circle, some kind of circle or something?
Mr. JENNER - Do you have that?
Mr. PIC - What she lived on described the street, it was a circle, something like that.
Mr. JENNER - Her first house and apartment in New York was 325, that was your apartment, 325 East 92.
And then she moved over to 1455 Sheridan Avenue in the Bronx, and then 825 East 179th Street in the
Bronx. 3124 West Fifth Street, Fort Worth.
Mr. PIC - That isn't familiar.
Mr. JENNER - It is not familiar?
Mr. PIC - It could be it, though, I can probably find it on the map of Fort Worth if we still have got it
because I remember that place real well. I was thrown out of there. Some people hold a grudge a long
time. Sir, that is probably it, West Fifth Street, because the location West Fifth Street is probably about
the same place.
Mr. JENNER - You said you were thrown out of there. I assume an incident occurred?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I am getting to that.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - While we were staying there. I was traveling cross country. and really didn't know where I was
going or what time I would have to be there. We were waiting for our port call to know when we would
have to be in San Francisco to catch our flight out of there, and so I had no idea how long I would be in
Fort Worth, and so I made a phone call from there to Mitchell to try to find out, and didn't find out
anything.
Then the Sunday that we were there---well, prior to this, when we arrived there the same day my
brother Robert came over to see us. He was then working for a milk company, Borden's Milk Co., I
believe. He was giving my mother free milk, all the extras that he had and so forth.
Mr. JENNER - This is the first time you had seen your brother Robert, I take it, since his visit to New York
City, is that correct?
Mr. PIC - That is correct.
upset her, after we left, after I gave her $10. So, we went to my brother Robert's, we ate, we stayed at
their house until Tuesday morning, and we left and then went to Japan, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Let's suspend for dinner.
Mr. PIC - Could I just add one thing, sir?
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - While we were there, I was informed that Lee was in Japan.
Mr. JENNER - You were informed by your mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. And that we should see him when we get there.
Mr. JENNER - Were you advised as to where in Japan he was?
Mr. PIC - I was given his address, sir. After arriving there it was just a matter of a week or so I received a
letter from my mother which I never acknowledged or maybe it was my brother, it was one of the two,
saying Lee was traveling across the United States at the same time I was. He had left Japan before I
arrived in Japan. I arrived in Japan 10 November 1958 and I don't know what date he left, sir. I never got
to see him in Japan. This would probably be a good time to suspend.
Mr. JENNER - Before we do that, did you have any conversation with your brother about, your brother
Robert about your brother Lee while you were there in 1958?
Mr. PIC - I think I may have let him know how Lee acted toward me. He didn't want nothing to do with
me. The only things I heard about Lee was that he was in the Marine Corps and he liked it.
Mr. JENNER - Did your brother Robert say anything about having been in New Orleans before he came
to Fort Worth?
Mr. PIC - He told me about a trip that he made to pick them up or something down there. They called
him up one time and he drove down and got them and drove back all in the same trip.
Mr. JENNER - That must have been the time when they left New Orleans and came to Fort Worth.
Mr. PIC - Sir, in the testimony of Marilyn Murret, I am going to make a statement.
Mr. JENNER - What testimony of Marilyn Murret?
Mr. PIC - This is what I am going to tell you that prior to his defection she knew he was in Europe and
everywhere that I read in here, no one knew he was going to Europe. She informed me before anyone
knew he defected that he was in Europe.
Mr. JENNER - Who informed you?
Mr. PIC - Marilyn Murret in Japan. She was in Japan. She visited with me.
Mr. JENNER - All right. I will go into that right after dinner.
Mr. PIC - All right, sir.
Mr. JENNER - We will suspend until 7:30. (Whereupon, at 6:30 p.m., the proceeding was recessed.)
Mr. PIC - Right. In approximately October-November, early November, the end of October 1959 she
called me up at the hospital. and it bad been years since I had seen her, and she told me she had come
from Australia. She was traveling around the world, and I invited her out to the house the next
weekend.
She couldn't come during the week. She was teaching school in Japan and as a freelance teacher
working for no agency, just doing this to earn her own traveling money. So she visited us on a Sunday, I
believe.
We talked about the family and everything. She talked about Lee, about how proud he was to be in the
Marine Corps, and he really put on a big show about this.
Mr. JENNER - How did she know that, did she reveal?
Mr. PIC - She had seen him,'evidently, when he was first in the Marine Corps. She described him in
uniform, and-Mr. JENNER - You had the impression she had actually seen him in Japan?
Mr. PIC - No; she wasn't in Japan the same time he was. This is a year after I am in Japan, sir, before I
had seen her.
Mr. JENNER - I see.
Mr. PIC - And she had seen him when he first joined the Marine Corps, is my impression, sometime
while he was in the Marine Corps and in the States.
Mr. JENNER - You had the impression that Lee had visited their home in New Orleans?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that is the impression I got.
Mr. JENNER - Go on.
Mr. PIC - Well, at this time, my mother was still writing to me, I never answered any of her letters.
Maybe I would receive a letter from her every once, every 2 or 3 months. I also was aware of the fact
that Lee was going to be discharged from the Marine Corps.
Mr. JENNER - You became aware of that through what means?
Mr. PIC - The letters I would receive from my mother. She informed me that Marilyn Murret--that Lee
upon his discharge had gone to Europe. I asked her how did he ever decide that, and where did he get
the money and she said he saved it while he was in the Marine Corps.
Mr. JENNER - Did she say he had gone to Europe?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. Her quote, sir, to the best of my knowledge, "Do you know that Lee is in Europe?" I
said, "No, I don't know that." I had no way of knowing that. So I started asking her about him, and this is
what she told me that Lee had gone to Europe.
It was that night, sir, on the 9 o'clock news that I learned that Lee had defected.
Mr. JENNER - You say 9 o'clock news--was that-Mr. PIC - Japan time, sir, that night.
Mr. JENNER - I mean, what source was the news?
Mr. PIC - American Armed Forces Network. My wife and I were in bed, and I was about half asleep, and
the radio was closest to her and she nudged me and told me, and I said, "No, it couldn't be." So the next
day it appeared in the paper.
Mr. JENNER - What paper?
Mr. PIC - The Stars and Stripes, sir. Then I heard it on the radio again the next day. There were a couple
or three articles in the Stars and Stripes about his defection. And I reported to the OSI and told them
who I was, and I told them who he was. Then I got in contact with the Embassy in Japan.
Mr. JENNER - That is the American Embassy?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; and attempted to contact Lee. The only thing I could get out was a telegram. I think my
quote in the telegram was "Please reconsider your actions." This, I understand, was delivered to him at
the Metropole Hotel in Moscow. After this defection I received several-Mr. JENNER - Excuse me.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - When you heard this what was your reaction?
Mr. PIC - I didn't believe it. I mean my wife told me it was him, and I think I stayed awake until the 10
o'clock news to hear it and they mentioned it, and that was it, and so the next day it was in the paper
and that is when I reported to the OSI.
Mr. JENNER - What is OSI ?
Mr. PIC - Office of Special Investigator, I believe, for the Air Force.
Mr. JENNER - Well, after the rebroadcasts and you became convinced it was your brother what was your
reaction?
Mr. PIC - It was hard to believe. It was just something you never expect.
Mr. JENNER - Had he done or said anything during all your life together which served to lead you to
think, well maybe it is so that he has?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir, ever since he was born and I was old enough to remember, I always had a feeling that
some great tragedy was going to strike Lee in some way or another, and when this happened I figured
this was it. In fact, on the very day of the assassination I was thinking about it when I was getting ready
to go to work, and just, I was thinking about him at that time and I figured when he defected and came
back--that was his big tragedy. I found out it wasn't.
Mr. JENNER - Would you give me elaborate on that. Why did you have a feeling for some time that
someday he would have, would suffer a great tragedy?
Mr. PIC - I don't know. It was just one of those things I can't explain. always had this feeling about him.
Not as a kid, of course, but in my young adulthood I thought that about him, especially after the incident
in New York. I thought this way. I had this feeling.
Mr. JENNER - You had a feeling at any time that he was groping for a position station in life, that he
realized was beyond his attainment, or any resentment on his part of his station in life?
Mr. PIC - I think he resented the fact that he never really had a father, especially after he lost Mr. Ekdahl
and his one and only chance to get what he was looking for. Maybe that is why he looked to Robert and
I like he did.
Mr. JENNER - Did you see Marilyn Murret again?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; she and I never discussed this. Those were the orders of OSI not to discuss it with
anyone. I made them aware of her, her presence in Japan. I don't know if they ever contacted her or
not, sir. I told them about mentioning this to me that she knew he was in Europe. How she knew, know,
sir. And everything I have read states that no one knew he was going.
Mr. JENNER - But she was in your home?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The very day that the announcement was made?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That Lee had defected to Russia?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; and the radio wasn't on or anything. I had the hi-fi, she liked classical music, and I was
playing some of my records for her, and at time during the day did we have any radio broadcasts. She
came about Maybe it was on prior to this, I don't think so, because at 9 o'clockMr. JENNER - If it had been on, prior to that time, she didn't mention any defection? All she said to you
was, "Did you know that Lee was in Europe?" Is that correct?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir. She didn't specify any country. In fact, I asked her what country, and she
said she didn't know. She just knew he was in Europe. She had come from Australia to Japan. I think she
may have been in Japan a month prior to contacting me, a month, a little less probably.
Mr. JENNER - You saw her again after that, did you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; she visited our house several times. I think the last we seen her was about April or May
1960 when she left Japan. We never her again. She said she would contact us and tell us when she was
leaving but she never did.
Mr. JENNER - What was your assignment in Japan?
Mr. PIC - I was a medical laboratory technician at the hospital there, sir.
Mr. JENNER - When did you return to the United States?
Mr. PIC - July 1962, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And to where did you return?
Mr. PIC - To Lackland Air Force Base where I am presently stationed. In Japan there is more that
happened, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - I received--I wrote Lee, I mean Robert, and asked him about this. Of course in Japan we didn't
get much news and the OSI wouldn't tell me too The Embassy, all they confirmed is that he did defect. I
guess in a period of 2, 3 months I got information from Robert through several letters. Every time I got
some information I went to the OSI about this. It seems there a letter, I don't remember if Robert had
copied it from Lee's letter or he had sent me the original letter. I showed this, I gave it to the OSI. If they
it back, it is destroyed now, sir. In this letter he said that no one should try to contact him because the
American capitalists would be listening over the phone. He mentioned that he had been contemplating
this act for quite awhile. no one knew it. This is all in my OSI report.
And from what other information I had, I received the impression that him turning toward communism
or Marxism, whichever you want to call it, took place while he was in Japan and in the Marine Corps, sir,
from the insinuations that were involved in the letter or from his own statements.
Mr. JENNER - Up to this time, Sergeant, in all your association with your brother, had there been
occasions when there were discussions with him in the family about any theories or reactions of his
toward democracy, communism, Marxism, or any other form of government?
Mr. PIC - Sir, the last time he talked to me, I think he was only about 12, 13 years old.
Mr. JENNER - Well, the answer is no?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; that is the answer--no, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That is that there hadn't been any such discussions?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You--I take it from that answer--you never heard him assert any views?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - On his part, with respect to that subject matter?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
While I was processing to return to the States, I had seen in the paper and everything that Lee was
returning to the United States. When I got my assignment to Lackland, the OSI kind of put it to me that if
I didn't want to be in' the same vicinity as Lee that they could change my orders, and I told them that
the United States felt he was reliable enough for, confident enough in him to let him return, that I would
see no reason to change my assignment. The OSI authorities said there was no objection to me visiting
him, talking to him or anything else. So I didn't make any attempt to get my assignment changed
because of these reasons. Being it was close enough, you know, to see him fairly easily.
Mr. JENNER - Did anything else occur that you think is pertinent to the time of your return to the United
States?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; the only thing I knew about him was what I read in the newspaper about him returning
with his wife and child.
Mr. JENNER - When you say newspapers this is the Stars and Stripes?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; Stars and Stripes.
Mr. JENNER - That is before you returned to this country you had read in the Stars and Stripes that he
had returned to the United States?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; he was on his way, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He was on his way back?
Mr. PIC - He was on his way back at the same time I was on my way back.
Mr. JENNER - You knew he was on his way back, according to the Stars and Stripes, with his wife and
child?
Mr. PIC - Yes; sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you arrived at Lackland Air Force Base when?
Mr. PIC - I arrived in the San Antonio area approximately the 21st of July 1962, and got a house, got
settled and then I signed in on my base in August. I was permitted 30 days leave, 13 days travel time,
which I took advantage of. I think I took 27 days leave. So I started work in August, the latter part of
August.
Mr. JENNER - During that period of time of your 30 days' leave, after arriving at Lackland Air Force Base
and San Antonio, did you, make any attempt to find out anything about your brother, where he was?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I called Robert, and we wrote a couple of letters, and he told me Lee was back, and he
was living in Dallas and working there. and everything seemed to be okay.
Mr. JENNER - Did your brother tell you that Lee, when he returned to this country, had lived with him for
a while?
Mr. PIC - I don't know if it was in these conversations. I learned at the Thanksgiving reunion that he did.
Mr. JENNER - Which was Thanksgiving of 1962?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Up to the time you saw your brother, I take it, you saw him Thanksgiving 1962?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; we arrived at my brother Robert's Thanksgiving Day between about 11:30, 12:30.
Mr. JENNER - In the morning?
Mr. PIC - In the morning. We were to meet Lee and his wife at the Greyhound bus station approximately
2 o'clock. So Robert and I went down to pick him up. We picked them up outside the Greyhound bus
station. Whether or not they--we had no way of seeing them getting off a bus. They were at the station
when we got there. We did all the friendly sayings and I was-Mr. JENNER - Tell us what happened now? What was the attitude, what were your impressions?
Mr. PIC - Well, I still was wondering if he was going to have this feeling of hostility toward me that he
had shown the last time he had seen me, but it didn't manifest itself whatsoever. He introduced me to
his wife, and I gave her a kiss, and his child. We got in the car, and he said I hadn't changed much, and
we just talked like that. At no time did Marina speak any English. She would ask him questions in what I
believe was Russian and he would talk back to her in--and talk through.
Mr. JENNER - Did you have any discussion with him on that subject--where he had learned Russian?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir, I knew he had been in Russia over 2 years, so evidently he had learned Russian while
there.
Mr. JENNER - There was no occasion because of that, it never occurred to you to ask him about how and
when he had learned?
Mr. PIC - I wasn't going to pry into his affairs, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You didn't?
Mr. JENNER - What was his--what impression did you have as to his overall attitude? What impression
did you have as to his state of mind?
Mr. PIC - He impressed me that he was glad to be back, that he didn't really enjoy his stay in Russia. He
commented about the hard life they had there.
Mr. JENNER - What did he say about that?
Mr. PIC - What did he say, sir?
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - A shortage of food, rationing of certain items, about eating a lot of cabbage. He did say that the
U.S. Government gave him the money to come back on. He was in the process of paying them back. In
fact, he let it be known that regardless of anything else he was going to pay the Government back.
Mr. JENNER - Did he say "regardless of anything else, I am going to pay them back"? On what do you
base that conclusory statement?
Mr. PIC - Well, he made the statement they paid and he is paying them back, and he has got this job and
he was telling me his financial situation, and saying so much money is going to pay the Government
back.
Mr. JENNER - What did he say about his financial situation ?
Mr. PIC - He didn't give me this is what he gave me for an address. He said he lived in an apartment, one
room apartment. They had no television, no radio, no coffee pot. In fact, we brought him a coffee pot
for a present. Gave them a coffee pot and bought the little girl a stuffed animal of some type.
Mr. JENNER - Thanksgiving Day you did this?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - How come you brought him a coffee pot?
Mr. PIC - I was going to give him a present.
Mr. JENNER - It is the coffee pot that interests me. Here you hadn't seen him for a long time, you were
bringing him a gift--why were you-Mr. PIC - Well, my wife being a Yankee--Mr. JENNER - Why did you bring him a coffee pot?
Mr. PIC - My wife in her Yankee ways believed when you don't see people a long time you bring them a
gift. It's just a token. We brought my brother Robert a present, a set of dishes I had in Japan, I bought
them in Japan, and so naturally we couldn't give them anything without giving the other people
something.
Mr. JENNER - It isn't the fact that you brought him a gift. I can understand that. That would be, I might
be even a little surprised if you hadn't. It is the particular gift in which I am interested. Why did you
select a coffee pot? Was there something that led to that particular selection on your part?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; we didn't know what really to bring them, and my wife says, it was one of these glass
coffee pots that you put the candle under, you see, it wasn't a regular percolator. It was one of these
that a hostess always likes to have available to pour coffee out of.
Mr. JENNER - I see.
Mr. PIC - And my wife had one, and she liked it so she figured we would give them one.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Tell us everything that occurred on that day, what he said, what Robert said that is pertinent, what you
said, things that occurred, just completely exhaust your recollection.
Mr. PIC - Well, Lee informed us that he was working at some type photography printing company.
Mr. JENNER - In Dallas?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; in Dallas.
Mr. JENNER - You were advised during the course of that day he was then at that time living in Dallas?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that is what he said.
Mr. JENNER - And working in some kind of photographic work in Dallas?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right.
Mr. PIC - I said he referred to their living conditions.
Mr. JENNER - What did he say?
Mr. PIC - They had a one-room, I think it was one room. They ate and slept in the same room, I believe.
They had no radio, no TV. That Marina, when they first arrived, was really astounded about
supermarkets. Every time she went in one she lost control of herself.
Marina herself wore no lipstick, very plainly dressed. Lee appeared to be a good father in that he would
relieve Marina the burden of holding the child and taking care of it.
Mr. JENNER - How was he attired when you met him at the bus station?
Mr. PIC - He had on a sport jacket and tie. Sports jacket and tie.
Mr. PIC - I wouldn't remember that, sir. If it was any talk it was probably on caring, and so forth, about
the child and so forth, which is small talk to the men, of course.
Mr. JENNER - Did you learn on that day that Lee had lived with your brother for a while?
Mr. PIC - I had learned during that time period that Lee and Marina had lived with Robert when they
returned, and that an attempt was made by the press and TV to contact them, but Robert wouldn't let
them. Fie wasn't going to go through it again. Robert only had a one two-bedroom apartment, I mean
house, and I am sure when we stayed there we were crowded a little bit. My wife and I slept on the
floor, and I am sure Marina and Robert, I don't know where they slept--I mean Lee.
Mr. JENNER - Your children slept in the bed and you and your wife slept on a mattress on the floor?
Mr. PIC - A couple of blankets on the floor, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you learn during that period of time that Lee had lived with your brother for a time?
Mr. PIC - Possibly, sir; I don't recall.
Mr. JENNER - Was anything said about the fact or any allusion to the fact that during this period, up to
Thanksgiving Day, there had been a time when Marina had not lived with your brother Lee?
Mr. PIC - No, sir. I understood they arrived from New York, at New York together, and proceeded--there
was a short stay, I think, mentioned in New York. Where they stayed, I don't know, sir, and then they
proceeded to Texas and lived with Robert.
Mr. JENNER - I am referring particularly to September and October and part of November 1962. Was
there any reference or any discussion of it or anything said in your presence of the fact that Marina had
lived apart, separate and apart from Lee?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - During one or more periods of time in September or October and November 1962?
Mr. PIC - Possibly it could have been being Marina stayed there while Lee went to look for a job in
Dallas, I think, that may have been mentioned.
Mr. JENNER - Was there at any time mentioned even while he was working in Fort Worth, fully
employed that she had separated from him and gone to live elsewhere?
Mr. PIC - I am not aware that he did work in Fort Worth, sir, at any time.
Mr. JENNER - You didn't learn at that time, Thanksgiving, that he had worked in Fort Worth?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was the Leslie Welding Co. mentioned at all?
Mr. PIC - Something about welding was mentioned, that he tried it when he first came back, now that
you mention it.
Mr. JENNER - Was it your impression or did you gain the impression then that he had had some
employment in Fort Worth then as a welder ?
Mr. PIC - I don't remember if it was Fort Worth, sir, or where it was. I just know that welding was
mentioned.
Mr. JENNER - In that connection, was it mentioned or in any fashion indicated to you that he had been
employed as a welder whether in Fort Worth or otherwise, but he had been employed as a welder?
Mr. PIC - It was my impression because of his experience in the Soviet Union working with metals that
this helped him in getting his job as a welder.
Mr. JENNER - When he first returned?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And that that was a position or work that he had had prior to the time that he obtained
the position in Dallas about which he spoke?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That is a position preceding his work in the photography field in some firm in Dallas?
Mr. PIC - Right.
Mr. JENNER - Anything said about his financial status--that is, his and Marina's, and the child?
Mr. PIC - Well, he said he wasn't making very much money, but they were managing to get by. They
couldn't afford a TV, couldn't afford a radio, couldn't afford these necessities of life.
Mr. JENNER - Did he say anything during the course of that day on the subject of any political philosophy
of his?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; not at all.
Mr. JENNER - Politics wasn't discussed?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Whether party politics or politics in the broad sense?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; not at all.
Mr. JENNER - How did he look to you physically as compared with when you had seen him last?
Mr. PIC - I would have never recognized him, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Your brother Robert said something along these lines. You had last seen him in
19-- that was prior to this occasion, the last time you had seen him was when he was in New York City?
Mr. PIC - Which was a little over 10 years.
Mr. JENNER - Well, just about 10 years.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Of course you had seen him in February 1953, I think you said.
Mr. PIC - Right. But we walked in and he walked out.
Mr. JENNER - But you saw him?
Mr. PIC - Right, I had seen him for a moment.
Mr. JENNER - He was then at that particular time in the neighborhood of 13 years of age?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Now, when you saw him 10 years later he was 23.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You noticed, did you, a material change, physically first, let's take his physical appearance?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. Physically I noticed that.
Mr. JENNER - What did you notice?
Mr. PIC - He was much thinner than I had remembered him. He didn't have as much hair.
Mr. JENNER - Did that arrest your attention? Was that a material difference? Did that strike you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; it struck me quite profusely.
Mr. JENNER - What else did you notice about his physical appearance that arrested your attention?
Mr. PIC - His face features were somewhat different, being his eyes were set back maybe, you know like
in these Army pictures, they looked different than I remembered him. His face was rounder. Marilyn had
described him to me when he went in the Marine Corps as having a bull neck. This I didn't notice at all. I
looked for this, I didn't notice this at all, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He seemed more slender?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - He had materially less hair?
Mr. PIC - He said it and give me the impression because of his citizenship status being he had a
dishonorable discharge.
Mr. JENNER - Did you ever see your brother Lee Harvey Oswald drive an automobile?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; never in my life.
Mr. JENNER - While you boys were still in Fort Worth and before you enlisted in the Coast Guard in
January 1950 had you--you had an automobile, didn't you?
Mr. PIC - I drove the family car.
Mr. JENNER - Did your brother Robert drive?
Mr. PIC - He may have known how. He was not permitted to drive the family car.
Mr. JENNER - I remember when I was a boy I wasn't permitted to drive the family car, in the broad
sense.
Mr. PIC - Right. He never swiped it.
Mr. JENNER - I was permitted to drive it up and down the driveway or when my father was with me, I
could drive it around the block or something like that the way kids do. Was Robert permitted to do that
on a limited scale?
Mr. PIC - I wouldn't remember that, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you own what we used to call in my day an old jalopy while you were still in Fort
Worth?
Mr. PIC - That picture of that automobile there was quite an old jalopy, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That was before you enlisted?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did your brother Robert ever drive that?
Mr. PIC - To the best of my recollection, no, sir. In fact, I only drove it a few times myself. This is the
picture with the dog.
Mr. JENNER - That is the picture of the car in John Pic's Exhibit No. 55?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Lee never drove it, to your knowledge?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right, tell us the circumstances. tell us what led up to this incident, and tell us all about
the incident.
Mr. PIC - Well, they made the phone call, and Lee said that they would be picked up by their friends, and
I think sometime between 6 and 7 that night he came by. Now, my brother Robert, whenever he
introduces me to anyone always refers to me as his brother Lee referred to me as his half brother when
he introduced me.
Mr. JENNER - On this occasion?
Mr. PIC - It was very pronounced. He wanted to let the man know I was only his half brother. And this
kind of peeved me a little bit. Because we never mentioned the fact that we were half brothers.
Mr. JENNER - You never had that feeling?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was this the first time that your brother had ever introduced you to anyone as his haft
brother? I am talking about your brother Lee now.
Mr. PIC - I think possibly, sir, this is the first time he ever introduced me to anyone.
Mr. JENNER - Was this the first time he had ever referred to you as your half brother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - His half brother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Is that so?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And that irritated you on this occasion?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. Right then and there I had the feeling that the hostile feeling was still there. Up until
this time it didn't show itself, but I felt then, well, he still felt the same way.
Mr. JENNER - This young man from the University of Oklahoma, whose name, by the way, was Gregory
Mr. PIC - He was at the University of Oklahoma.
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - I have said this three or four times, I wasn't certain, but I am sure he was and I was introduced
to him as Lee's half brother, and the man was studying Russian at the school. His parents were from
Russia.
Mr. PIC - Yes; as long as we stuck within the pharmacy and medical field.
Mr. JENNER - Did she know some English terms in the pharmacy, medical field?
Mr. PIC - She used Latin phrases, some of which were familiar to me.
Mr. JENNER - Just what was that writing, some medical terms?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I think these are names of drugs she was writing down. I wouldn't know.
Mr. JENNER - There is a large letter "B" on that page. How did that get on there?
Mr. PIC - I don't know, sir. I don't know, sir. I wouldn't venture a guess whose handwriting it is.
Mr. JENNER - There is a square to the left of the handwriting in Russian, what does that signify?
Mr. PIC - This was placed there by the Secret Service, in San Antonio, sir, to identify the handwritings in
this book, the square being the handwriting of Marina Oswald, the parentheses being the handwriting of
myself and the mark with the circle being the handwriting of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - So that wherever throughout that book a zero appears that is the handwriting of Lee
Harvey Oswald?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Wherever the parentheses mark appears that is. your handwriting?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And wherever the square appears that is Marina's handwriting?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Turn the page over. On the reverse side of that page that is all your handwriting?
Mr. PIC - Except this up here, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The reverse side of the previous page.
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that is my handwriting.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Now, the front side of the next page which has the letter "A" printed on it, in the
upper right-hand corner. Is that in your handwriting?
Mr. PIC - Everything except this top portion, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The top portion?
Mr. PIC - Starting with liquid measure would be my handwriting.
Mr. PIC - This was--I was permitted to make the phone call after Lee's murder. The Secret Service said I
could contact Robert. He had called where I worked and left a number. I contacted the Secret Service.
They told me go ahead and call this number, call them back and tell them the gist of the conversation.
I called him up at this number. Someone answered the phone and I asked for Robert and they called him
to the phone. He told me that he and his--told me his wife and children were at the farm with her folks, I
believe that is what he told me. That he was--he couldn't tell me where he was but he was in Arlington,
Tex.
Mr. JENNER - Robert was?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; under custody of the Secret Service.
Mr. JENNER - What day of the week was this ?
Mr. PIC - This was Sunday, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The day of the death of your brother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The 24th of November 1963?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - What else was said?
Mr. PIC - He told me that some local business people would make arrangements for the funeral and
there would be no expense to him. I told him I was sorry it happened and everything.
Mr. JENNER - Did he say anything about having seen your brother at the Dallas City Police Station prior
to this telephone conversation?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; he didn't.
Mr. JENNER - Was there any discussion in this telephone conversation about the assassination of
President Kennedy?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; there wasn't.
Mr. JENNER - About the possible involvement of your brother in that connection?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; there wasn't.
Mr. JENNER - I take it, then, it was confined largely, if not exclusively, to the death of your brother?
Mr. PIC - The conversation was just about as I related it, sir. It was mostly confined to the death of Lee.
Mr. JENNER - And his burial?
Mr. JENNER - Well, anything you think that might be relevant to the Commission's investigation as to the
circumstances surrounding the assassination of President Kennedy, any persons involved therein, the
subsequent death of your brother.
Mr. PIC - Most of the information that I have seen and heard has been all new to me, like his escapades
in New Orleans, passing out the leaflets and his radio program.
Mr. JENNER - Those incidents, by the way, were unknown to you until after the assassination, I take it?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I assure you if I had known he was doing his escapades again I would have went to the
proper authorities about it.
Mr. JENNER - I show you an exhibit, a series of exhibits, first Commission Exhibit No. 281 and Exhibit No.
282 being some spread pages of an issue of Life magazine of February 21, 1964. I direct your attention
first to the lower lefthand spread at .the bottom of the page. Do you recognize the area shown there?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Do you see somebody in that picture that appears to be your brother?
Mr. PIC - This one here with the arrow.
Mr. JENNER - The one that has the printed arrow?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you recognize that as your brother?
Mr. PIC - Because they say so, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Please, I don't want you to say-Mr. PIC - No; I couldn't recognize that.
Mr. JENNER - Because this magazine says that it is.
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I couldn't recognize him from that picture.
Mr. JENNER - You don't recognize anybody else in the picture after studying it that appears to be your
brother? When I say your brother now, I am talking about Lee.
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - In the upper portion there are a series of photographs spread from left-hand page across
to the right-hand page. Take those on the left which appears to be a photograph of three young men.
Do you recognize the persons shown in that photograph?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I recognize ,this photograph, the people from left to right being Robert Oswald, the center
one being Lee Oswald, and the third one being myself. This picture was taken at the house in Dallas
when we returned from New Orleans.
Mr. JENNER - You mean from--when you came from New Orleans after being at the Bethlehem
Orphanage Home?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you went to Dallas?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - It was taken in Dallas at or about that time?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The next one is prominent; in front is a picture of a young boy. There is a partially shown
girl and apparently another boy with a striped shirt in the background. Do you recognize that picture?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I recognize that as Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - Do you have any impression as to when and where that was taken?
Mr. PIC - Just looking at the picture, I would guess first, second grade, maybe. I would have to guess at it.
Mr. JENNER - Then there is one immediately to the right of that, a young man in the foreground sitting
on the floor, with his knees, legs crossed, and his arms also crossed. There are some other people
apparently in the background.
Mr. PIC - I recognize that as Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - Does anything about the picture enable you to identify as to where that was taken?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Then to the right there is a picture of two young men, the upper portion of the one young
man at the bottom and then apparently a young man standing up in back of that person. Do you
recognize either of those young people?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I recognize Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - Is he the one to which the black arrow is pointing?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Then right below that is a picture of a young man standing in front of an iron fence, which
appears to be probably at a zoo. Do you recognize that?
Mr. PIC - Sir, from that picture, I could not recognize that that is Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - That young fellow is shown there, he doesn't look like you recall Lee looked in 1952 and
1953 when you saw him in New York City?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Commission Exhibit No. 284 do you recognize anybody in that picture that appears to be
Lee Oswald?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - There is a young fellow in the foreground-everybody else is facing the other way. He is in a
pantomime, or grimace. Do you recognize that as Lee Harvey Oswald?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; looking at that picture and I have looked at it several times--that looks more like Robert
than it does Lee, to my recollection.
Mr. JENNER - All right. On Exhibit No. 286, the lower right-hand corner, there is another picture. Do you
recognize that as your brother Lee in that picture?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; that is about how he looked when I seen him in 1962, his profile.
Mr. JENNER - Do you recognize the person, the lady to the right who is pointing her finger at him?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I don't.
Mr. JENNER - Exhibit No. 287 is two figures, taking them from top to bottom and in the lower right-hand
corner, do you recognize those?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I don't.
Mr. JENNER - Neither one of them?
Mr. PIC - No, sir. The lower one appears to me to look like Robert rather than Lee. The upper one, unless
they tell me that, I would never guess that that would be Lee, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Exhibit No. 288, there is ill the lower left-hand corner, there is a reproduction of a
service card and a reproduction, also, of a photograph with the head of a man. Do you recognize that?
Mr. PIC - That looks to me approximately how Lee Oswald looked when I seen him Thanksgiving 1962.
Mr. JENNER - Directing your attention to Exhibit, Commission Exhibit No. 289, do you recognize any of
the servicemen shown in that picture as your brother Lee?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I do not recognize them.
Mr. JENNER - Exhibit No. 290, the lower left-hand corner there is a photograph of a young lady and a
young man. Do you recognize either of those persons?
Mr. PIC - He appears to me as Lee Harvey Oswald in 1962 when I seen him.
Mr. JENNER - And the lady?
Mr. PIC - She is his wife, Marina, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Commission Exhibit No. 291, at the bottom of the page, there is a picture of a young man
handing out a leaflet, and another man to the left of him who is reaching out for it. Do you recognize the
young man handing out the leaflet?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I would be unable to recognize him.
Mr. JENNER - As to whether he was your brother?
Mr. PIC - That is correct.
Mr. JENNER - Exhibit No. 292, in the upper right-hand corner, is a picture of a lady, a young lady with a
child. Do you recognize either of those persons?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I recognize Marina Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - And the baby?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I couldn't recognize the baby.
Mr. JENNER - Below that is a picture purporting to be that of your brother with a pistol on his right hip,
and with a firearm, a rifle in his left hand holding up what appear to be some leaflets. Do you recognize
that as your brother Lee?
Mr. PIC - That is how he looked to me in 1962 when I seen him, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That is a duplicate of the picture on the cover. You have produced for us a series of letters
from your mother to yourself, from your brother Lee to yourself, and from your brother Robert to
yourself which have been marked John Pic Exhibits Nos. 6 through 47, inclusive.
Did you assist Mr. Ely, in the preparation of this list of exhibits?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I arranged the stacks. He took it from the stacks I arranged previously.
Mr. JENNER - For the purpose of the record, then, John Pic Exhibit No. 6 is a letter from Marguerite
Oswald to John Pic, postmarked May 8, 1950, and its accompanying envelope as John Pic Exhibit No. 6A. John Pic Exhibit No. 7 is a letter from your mother to you, postmarked May 23, 1950, or the
enevelope is so postmarked. Its accompanying envelope being marked John Pic Exhibit No. 7-A. John Pic
Exhibit No. 8, a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in envelope, Exhibit No. 8-A,
postmarked at Fort Worth, May 24, 1950.
By the way, Exhibit No. 6-A is postmarked Fort Worth. All of these exhibits until I indicate otherwise
from here on are marked with a return address to M. Oswald, 9048 Ewing, Fort Worth, Tex.
Mr. PIC - 7408.
Mr. JENNER - What did I say? 7408; that is correct. You are right.
Exhibit No. 9 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic, accompanying envelope is Exhibit No. 9-A
postmarked June 9, 1950.
Exhibit No. 10 and its reverse side, which is marked Exhibit No. 10-B, is a letter from Lee Harvey Oswald
to John Pie enclosed in envelope marked John Pie Exhibit No. 10-A, postmarked at Fort Worth, Tex., on
August 23, 1950. This enevelope has no return address on it.
Exhibit No. 11 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic in an envelope postmarked August 15,
1950, marked Exhibit No. 11-A.
Exhibit No. 12 is a letter from Marguerite to John Pic enclosed in envelope postmarked November 6,
1950, and identified as John Pic Exhibit No. 12-A.
The next is John Pic Exhibit No. 13, a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in envelope
postmarked December 13, 1950, the envelope being marked John Pic Exhibit No. 13-A. This does have
the return address Lee Oswald, 7408 Ewing, Fort Worth, Tex.
The next is a short longhand note on a small sheet marked John Pic Exhibit No. 14 which is undated, Lee
Harvey Oswald to John Pic, which was enclosed with Exhibit No. 13.
The next is a card, Christmas card, marked John Pic Exhibit No. 15, inside cover of which in longhand
says, "Dear Pic," and then there is in longhand and pencil "I sure am sorry that you can't come home for
Christmas so I am sending you this fruitcake. Merry Christmas"--spelled Mary--"from Lee."
The next is John Pic No. 16, a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in envelope marked
Pic Exhibit No. 16-A and postmarked in Fort Worth, April 16, 1951, with the usual return address.
Exhibit No. 17 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in envelope postmarked at Fort
Worth on April 23, 1951. That envelope is marked John Pic Exhibit No. 17-A. The previous envelope in
which Exhibit No. 16 was enclosed was marked Exhibit No. 16-A. I will say for the record in each instance
where there is a letter accompanied by an envelope, the envelope is marked with a letter "A" but with
the same number as the letter.
Exhibit No. 18 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in an envelope marked Exhibit No.
18-A, postmarked at Fort Worth, May 22, 1951.
The next is Exhibit No. 19, a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in an envelope marked
Exhibit No. 19-A. postmarked at Fort Worth on June 18, 1951.
Exhibit No. 20 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic and Exhibit No. 20--B is a birthday card
from Marguerite. Both are enclosed in an envelope marked John Pic Exhibit No. 20-A, postmarked at
Fort Worth, Tex., June 14, 1952, bearing the usual return address.
Exhibit No. 21 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in an envelope marked Pic Exhibit
No. 21-A, postmarked Fort Worth, July 14, 1952, with the usual return address.
The next is a letter without an envelope which is marked John Pic Exhibit No. 22. The letter is dated May
10, 1954.
The Exhibit No. 23 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed is an envelope, Exhibit No.
23- A, postmarked in New Orleans on June 14, 1954, containing the return address, M. Oswald, 1454 St.
Mary, New Orleans, La.
The next is Exhibit No. 24; it is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in an envelope
postmarked at New Orleans, October 14, 1954, which in turn is marked John Pic Exhibit No. 24-A. It
contains the return address, M. Oswald, 126 Exchange, New Orleans, La. If I neglected to do so, Exhibit
No. 22 is the letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic.
Exhibit No. 25 also is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in an envelope marked
Exhibit No. 25-A, postmarked at New Orleans, La. on November 12, 1954, containing return address, M.
Oswald, 126 Exchange, New Orleans, La.
Exhibit No. 26 is a letter from Marguerite Oswald to John Pic enclosed in an envelope marked Exhibit No.
26-A, postmarked at New Orleans, La. on November 11, 1954, return address, Mrs. M. Oswald, 126
Exchange, New Orleans, La. Mr. Pic., are Exhibits Nos. 6 and 6-A, 7 and 7-A, 8 and 8-A, 9 and 9-A, 10 and
10-A, 11 and 11-A excuse me, strike out that 10 and 10-A--11 and 11-A, 12 and 12-A, 16 and 16-A, 17
and 17-A, 18 and 18-A, 19 and 19-A, 20 and 20-A, 21 and 21--A, 22, 23 and 23-A, 24 and 24-A, 25 and 25A, 26 and 26-A, all in the handwriting of your mother Marguerite Oswald?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And were those envelopes addressed to you at various places you were then, that is as of
the time they were postmarked received by you at or about the postmarked dates or shortly thereafter
which each envelope bears?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - There is one exhibit that doesn't have an envelope. Was that letter received by you shortly
after the date it bears?
Mr. PIC - You refer to Exhibit No. 22, sir?
Mr. JENNER - Yes, sir.
Mr. PIC - To the best of my knowledge; yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - These are all, they all consist of correspondence from your mother to you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And they happen to be correspondence which you have retained over the years?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Except for the exhibit marks on those, they are in the same condition now as they were at
the time you received them and opened them in the case of the envelopes?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And that the letters are in the condition they were at the time you read them?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Go back to Pic Exhibit No. 10, in whose handwriting is that exhibit?
Mr. PIC - Exhibit No. 10, sir, is in the handwriting of--there is Exhibits Nos. 10, 10-A, and 10B.
Mr. JENNER - Exhibit No. 10, I am referring to.
Mr. PIC - They are both in the handwriting of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. JENNER - Exhibits Nos. 10 and 10-A; correct?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; Exhibits Nos. 10, 10-A, and 10B. Exhibit No. 10 is the insert in envelope Exhibit No.10-A.
Mr. JENNER - Then look at Exhibits Nos. 13 and 13-A.
Mr. PIC - They are marked Exhibits Nos. 13 and 13-A, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. The contents are marked Exhibit No. 13.
Mr. PIC - Yes, Sir.
Mr. JENNER - In whose handwriting is the envelope?
Mr. PIC - Lee Harvey Oswald's.
Mr. JENNER - And whose handwriting is that which appears in the inside of that card?
Mr. PIC - My mother's, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Is there any handwriting of Lee Harvey Oswald on that card?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The card was enclosed, was it in the exhibit marked John Pic No. 13-A?
Mr. PIC - I would speculate and say that Exhibit No. 10 goes in envelope Exhibit No. 10--A, and that
Exhibit No. 14 either came some little period of time before or after the contents in envelope Exhibit No.
10-A.
Mr. JENNER - That is while you were away at military school?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; this is when I am in the Coast Guard.
Mr. JENNER - All right. All those exhibits I have now identified, that is after I identified your mother's
letters, are in the handwriting of Lee Oswald?
Mr. PIC - All except Exhibit No. 13, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And Exhibit No. 13 is in the handwriting of your mother?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - It appears to be and is a Christmas card?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - From its contents are you able to tell us approximately when you received that?
Mr. PIC - It would be, I would say sometime after Christmas of 1950, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Would you put all those exhibits back in order?
Mr. PIC - What belongs with what I think.
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - Exhibits Nos. 13-A and 15 here, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You have already told us of Exhibits No. 13-A belonging with Exhibit No. 15. You have also
produced for us correspondence that you happen still to have in your possession from your brother
Robert Oswald, have you not?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I place that correspondence before you and ask you to follow me as I place the exhibit
numbers in the record. Exhibit No. 27 is a letter from Robert to you.
Mr. PIC - They are marked all with "B's."
Mr. JENNER - Exhibit No. 27-B is a letter from your brother Robert to you enclosed in an envelope
marked Exhibit No. 27-A, postmarked October 1, 1952?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. PIC - Exhibit No. 36-A bearing the postmark 27 September 1950, return address, M. Oswald, 7408
Ewing Street, Fort Worth, Tex.
Mr. JENNER - And postmarked at Fort Worth?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; postmarked at Fort Worth.
Mr. JENNER - Its contents marked--what is the exhibit number on the contents?
Mr. PIC - Exhibit No. 36-B, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Then the next exhibit?
Mr. PIC - The next Exhibit No. 37-A, postmarked Fort Worth, Tex., December 28, 1950, no return
address.
Mr. JENNER - The contents?
Mr. PIC - Christmas card marked Exhibit No. 37-B with a short note.
Mr. JENNER - In the handwriting of your mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Next exhibit?
Mr. PIC - Envelope Exhibit No. 38-A, postmarked Fort Worth, Tex., January 19, 1951, return address, M.
Oswald, 7408 Ewing, Fort Worth, Tex. Contents of envelope marked Exhibit No. 38-B containing a letter
from my mother to myself.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Next exhibit?
Mr. PIC - Envelope Exhibit No. 39-A postmarked Fort Worth Tex., April 6, 1951. The only thing made out
on the return address is "M.O. 7408 Fort Worth, Texas."
Mr. JENNER - Contents?
Mr. PIC - Contents Exhibit No. 39-B, a letter from my mother to myself, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Next exhibit?
Mr. PIC - Envelope marked Exhibit No. 40-A, postmarked Fort Worth, Tex., May 2, 1951, return address,
M. Oswald, 7408 Ewing, contents Exhibit No. 40-B letter from my mother to myself, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The next exhibit?
Mr. PIC - Envelope marked Exhibit No. 41-A postmarked Fort Worth, Tex., 7 May 1951, return address
7408, Mrs. M. Oswald, 7408 Ewing, Fort Worth, Tex., contents letter marked Exhibit No. 41-B, a letter
from my mother to myself, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you have retained them in your possession in the entire time?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - There is an exhibit still before you marked John Pic Exhibit No.
Mr. PIC - Exhibit No. 59.
Mr. JENNER - What is that?
Mr. PIC - This appears to be a "shot" record of Lee Harvey Oswald written in an unknown hand, which
gives him a smallpox date of August 7, 1951.
Mr. JENNER - How did that come into your possession?
Mr. PIC - It was just laying in the box with all this other stuff, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I offer those exhibits now commencing with Exhibit No. 31-A to and including Exhibits Nos.
47-B, plus 59, in evidence.
(The documents referred to were marked John Pic Exhibits Nos. 31-A to 47-B, inclusive, and Exhibit No.
59 for identification and received in evidence.)
Mr. JENNER - Mr. Pic, we have made copies of all those exhibits and we appreciate your bringing the
originals, and you may take the originals back with you to San Antonio. Those exhibits consisting of the
photographs of your brother which you brought, we will have duplicated and returned .to you in due
course.
Mr. PIC - All right.
Mr. JENNER - Direct your attention, if you will, to Exhibit No. 9-A, an envelope and its contents, Exhibit
No. 9, this being a letter from Fort Worth, June 9, 1950, to you at Brooklyn, N.Y.
There is an inside page reading, "Mother called in on and told some of my problems." Do you find that?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Uncle Dutz wired $75. That is your uncle Charles Murret?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And then it reads, "And Lee was invited to spend a couple of weeks, so I sent him on the
train by himself. To what is your mother referring in connection with her problems and the wiring of the
$75 by your uncle?
Mr. PIC - It appears to me, sir, that at this time period she was between jobs. Further down she states
she is starting on a new job Monday.
Mr. JENNER - Does she refer to that job on the page that is numbered 3, I believe, as McDonald Kitchens
is the name?
Mr. PIC - She first refers to it on the one where it begins, "Mother called in on".
Mr. JENNER - Now, the mother there mentioned is your mother, isn't it?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Then there is a page numbered 3?
Mr. PIC - That is right, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Which referred to McDonald's Kitchens as the name and what they do is cook food for
commercial use?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - "I will drive a station wagon and deliver the food, also."
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Is that a job she was about to obtain?
Mr. PIC - I can only assume from the letter, sir; I have no other knowledge of that.
Mr. JENNER - She makes a reference on that page "Haven't sold the house as yet but have a good
prospect." Calling your attention to the date, June 9, 1950, what house was that?
Mr. PIC - I am sure this refers to the little house in Benbrook, sir.
Mr. JENNER - It refers to people called DeLogans. Who are they?
Mr. PIC - I assume these people were renting the house from her, I don't remember them.
Mr. JENNER - That was a duplex of some kind?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; that was this little t.-shaped house.
Mr. JENNER - In all this correspondence, Sergeant, by and large your mother very frequently, if not all
the time, refers to her straitened circumstances, need for funds, and references to you having sent
money. In your testimony you have referred to conversations with her on the subject and she raised the
subject to you. Was that something .that was pretty constantly in her mind all the time?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; it was.
Mr. JENNER - Did she talk about that subject at times when you were of the opinion that she was not as
straitened as she appears to report in these letters?
Mr. PIC - My opinion, sir; at the time was all she cared about was getting hold of and making some
money in some form or another. This is her god, so to speak, was to get money. And to get as much out
of me as she could and as much out of Robert as she could.
Mr. JENNER - And as much out of anybody else as she could?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was there any--you talk about the difficulties with Mr. Ekdahl. Do you recall any
discussions between them with respect to any dissatisfaction on your mother's part with funds that
were given her by Mr. Ekdahl?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; she always wanted more money out of him. That was the basis of all the arguments.
Mr. JENNER - And was she complaining to him that he didn't give her enough money?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was your mother an extravagant person money-wise?
Mr. PIC - I don't know what she did with the money, sir. She bought very little as far as clothes and
things. We didn't eat steak every day. We didn't eat that good. In fact, when I joined the service in 1950,
I was 118 pounds, and my weight prior to that was usually about 130, 140. I think within a month or two
after I joined the service I was up to 145 and none of my uniforms fit me. I was--there is a picture of me
in the Pasqual High School thing, and I am very thin. People couldn't recognize me from that picture. I
lost a lot of weight working, and not eating too good. I would come home and have to fix my own meals.
Mr. JENNER - Was your mother attentive in that respect? Did she go out of her way to have meals ready
for you boys when you returned to home either after work or after school or otherwise?
Mr. PIC - If there was a majority eating there was usually something set aside for the lesser, which was
kept warm in the oven.
Mr. JENNER - You mean the member of the family who was absent at mealtime she would save
something for him?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you get the feeling, you and your brother, in due course, that your mother's references
to these financial needs at times, at least when, to use the vernacular, she was crying wolf?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - These continued references by her to her financial needs, did you think that had an effect
on Lee as well as on yourself and your brother?
Mr. PIC - It didn't affect me that much. I ignored most of them. If I had money I sent it. If I didn't, that
was it. Lee was brought up in this atmosphere of constant money problems, and I am sure it had quite
an effect on him, and Also Robert.
Mr. JENNER - In her letter enclosed in the envelope postmarked June 18, 1951-Mr. PIC - What number is that. sir?
Mr. JENNER - That is Exhibits Nos. 19 and 19-A--she makes reference that Robert has been saving his
money since January to buy a car and "gives me $15 a week and never spends a cent unless absolutely
necessary (is he tight) but he has saved $210 since the first of the year and is hiding"Mr. PIC - Hitting.
Mr. JENNER - "For $400" and so on.
Mr. PIC - Before buying a car.
Mr. JENNER - "Won't loan me a penny, pays his room and board regularly. He gets 2 weeks vacation with
pay, I believe, will start in July." Do you remember your mother attempting to borrow money from you?
Mr. PIC - When I went home on leave in 1950 with a hundred or so dollars, like I mentioned before, she
wanted to hold it, just about the whole amount except for about $10 from me, so nothing would happen
to it, and I might get robbed or something, she felt. Whenever she could she attempted to get a buck
out of any of us.
Mr. JENNER - Did you get any of that money back?
Mr. PIC - I got it all back and subsequently when I left I gave her, I think $50 or so.
Mr. JENNER - In that same letter she refers to. she said, "I only made $92 last month and am just starting
to get leads. I am back with the same company." To what company is she referring in that letter which is
postmarked June 18, 1951?
Mr. PIC - I don't know, sir. It sounds to me like it would be an insurance company.
Mr. JENNER - Do yon recall your mother selling insurance?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I knew approximately at this time period she sold insurance.
Mr. JENNER - There is a reference to Lee taking tap dancing lessons, also, in that letter, that he is a good
dancer, "with his voice it would be a good thing to start dancing lessons and when he is a little older
take voice."
Mr. PIC - I think this statement here about this practically like several other statements which are either
direct or indirect were an attempt to get me to donate some money to this cause or something else. Of
course this, to me, is a come-on for maybe next time I write I will say, "Hurrah, hurrah, Lee is going to
take tap dancing lessons" and then she will write and say she can't afford it and to send a little money to
help him. She did these things. In fact, in some of her letters she refers to it is my fault they are in
trouble because I stated I would help pay for the car and since I was in the service I wasn't holding up
my end of the bargain.
Mr. JENNER - What about that incident?
Mr. PIC - Sir, that is in the second group of letters.
Mr. JENNER - What about this particular incident you mentioned? What are the facts about that?
Mr. PIC - Just what it states here. This is all I know, sir. What it states in this letter.
Mr. JENNER - About the dancing and voice?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you ever hear of Lee, other than this letter of Lee taking dancing lessons?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you ever hear otherwise of his taking dancing lessons than in this letter?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did either you or Robert ever take dancing lessons or voice lessons?
Mr. PIC - I think when we were very small and Mr. Oswald was still alive we did, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Now, the other thing to which I referred, as you made reference to something about
making payments on a car. What was that about?
Mr. PIC - That would be in that second group, sir. In the second group is really the financial statements.
Every one of them contained something pertaining to her finances.
Mr. JENNER - The early enlistments of yourself and Robert and Lee--do you think that had anything to do
with your mother's persistent references, allusions to finances?
Mr. PIC - I did not enlist as fast as the other boys. I waited a year after I was of age. I am sure that prior
to my enlistment, as a matter of fact, I knew she mentioned when I do get in I should make out an
allotment to her and so forth.
Mr. JENNER - Do you think there was an incentive on the part of Lee and Robert to enlist as soon as
possible to get away from your mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I do.
Mr. JENNER - Did you and your brother Robert have discussions on this subject?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; we never discussed these things. It was just a feeling it was always around. We knew
these things without discussing them.
Mr. JENNER - Did you live in an atmosphere in which your mother directly or indirectly indicated to you
that she thought she had been unfairly dealt with in her life?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You had that very definite impression?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You had-Mr. PIC - I did not have this impression. She related this to me, sir. I didn't feel she had it any tougher
than a lot of people walking around.
Mr. JENNER - That is what I am getting at, this was an impression she was seeking to create.
Mr. PIC - That is right, sir.
Mr. JENNER - You felt she did not have it any tougher. She was creating an impression that did not
square with the facts?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir. Every time she met anyone she would remind them she was a widow with three
children.
Mr. JENNER - Do you have an opinion also as to whether this atmosphere in which Lee lived had an
effect upon him and his personality?
Mr. PIC - I am sure it did, sir. Also, Lee slept with my mother until I joined the service in 1950. This would
make him approximately 10, well, almost 11 years old.
Mr. JENNER - When you say slept with, you mean in the same bed?
Mr. PIC - In the same bed, sir.
Mr. JENNER - As far as you know or say when Lee came and stayed with you a short while in 1952 did he
likewise sleep with your mother?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; he did not.
Mr. JENNER - He had reached a measure of independence by that time?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir; when I left and went into the service there was a vacant bed in the house.
Mr. JENNER - And at that time was that literally the first time that Lee had separate quarters for himself
other than the period of time that Mr. Ekdahl lived with you and the period of time when your
stepfather Lee Oswald was alive?
Mr. PIC - Lee wasn't born when Lee Oswald was alive, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That is right. Well, then, except for the time Mr. Ekdahl lived with you?
Mr. PIC - That is true, sir. That would make him about 10 1/2 years old.
Mr. JENNER - Up to the time he was 10bd years old, why he roomed and slept with his mother in the
same bed?
Mr. PIC - I would like to interject here.
Mr. JENNER - Yes, I am seeking something of the personality of your mother and the effect on you, had
an effect on Robert, and probably a more material effect on Lee, is that correct?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I am sure it did. When I reached 17, I was eligible for the service, but I was really in no
hurry, I wanted to finish my high school education, and when I decided to join the Coast Guard--at that
time to join the Coast Guard you needed your parent's consent up until the age of 21. I asked her for it
and she hesitated and I told her if she didn't give it to me I would join another branch where I didn't
need it and then I got it. I am sure that neither Robert nor Lee needed their mother's consent to join the
Marine' Corps at the age of 17. I know for the Coast Guard we did, sir, the Coast Guard was not a part of
the Department of Defense at that time.
Mr. JENNER - Directing your attention to Exhibits Nos. 21 and 21-A, the second page of that letter,
Exhibit No. 21, reads, "Robert left Friday morning for San Diego. He joined the Marines and signed for 4
years. I am glad he decided to enlist. He realized his mistake about getting married, and"--would you
read the rest of it?
Mr. PIC - "And probably having to go just the same."
Mr. JENNER - "And then probably having to go just the same." Is that the incident in which your mother
opposed your brother Robert's marriage to the little crippled girl?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Turn to Exhibit No. 24. There is a reference there to a lady, Ethel somebody at Holmes.
Would you read that?
Mr. PIC - "Ethel Nunncy at Holmes asks about you."
Mr. JENNER - And that is--Holmes is a department store?
Mr. PIC - In New Orleans.
Mr. JENNER - The next letter, Exhibit No. 32-B, and' in an envelope marked in 1950, it says "Dear John,
Well, I have the house in Benbrook up for sale." Could you read the name?
Mr. PIC - It appears to me to be J. Piner Powell Real Estate is handling it. Do you want me to read on?
Mr. JENNER - Yes.
Mr. PIC - "The problem is to find someone with enough cash as a loan company won't make a new loan
and I have about $2,600 in it. Nothing but bad news. Up to date I am still not working." Read on, sir?
Mr. JENNER - That is about enough. Did your mother write you a letter that had good news in
Mr. PIC - I never recall one, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Around your home was the atmosphere that, "We are poor but we will get along?" as your
mother sought to lead you boys to accommodate yourselves to the circumstances that everything would
turn out all right eventually?
Mr. PIC - None of us really paid much attention to this, sir.- I didn't, and I am sure Robert didn't. I don't
think Lee did because Robert and I would probably talk and we didn't pay much attention to it.
Mr. JENNER - You heard it so often you just became inured to it, hardened to it; is that it?
Mr. PIC - Well, we didn't believe it after the problems she put on. Just like when my wife and I got
married she sent a package containing Revere Ware which I haven't received yet and she swears up and
down she sent it, and she has never gotten it in the return mail either. And I know she never sent
anything. When we would be home alone, before she would return from work, we have a rather friendly
atmosphere, but as soon as she came home we all got into that depression rut again.
Mr. JENNER - Was your-Mr. PIC - This is prior to my going in the service, sir.
Mr. JENNER - There were times that the atmosphere around your home was depressing?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And was that due largely to your mother?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - The things she said and the attitudes she assumed?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And while you and your brother got along well you boys were not getting along well with
your mother in that sense?
Mr. PIC - Robert and I and Lee, we had our fights among us, like all brothers do. But we could handle
ourselves and our own problems, but the atmosphere just changed when she was around.
Mr. JENNER - Did your mother ever say anything about whether people liked her or disliked her?
Mr. PIC - She didn't have to. She didn't have many friends and usually the new friends she made she
didn't keep very long.
Mr. JENNER - That was her history?
Mr. PIC - I remember every time we moved she always had fights with the neighbors or something or
another.
Mr. JENNER - Was she a person who was resentful of the status of others?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And you boys were aware of that, were you?
Mr. PIC - I was aware of it. She always--I remember once when we lived on Eighth Avenue, 1 believe was
the place, the people named McLean living next to us, of course he was an attorney and everything, and
they had some money, and my mother-Mr. JENNER - What town was this?
Mr. PIC - This was Fort Worth, sir. My mother remarked to me once that Mrs. McLean had said she went
and played the slot machines and lost $100 in it, and she raved and ranted about this for half an hour or
an hour about how this woman could go and waste 8100 and what she could do with it and everything.
She resented the fact this woman lost her own money.
Mr. JENNER - I haven't found a single letter yet, Sergeant, in which your mother fails to mention the
subject of money.
Mr. PIC - You may find a Christmas card, "Love, Mother," sir.
Mr. JENNER - A letter?
Mr. PIC - No, sir; I don't think you will. These are only part of them. I threw out a whole bunch a couple
of years ago. They were all basically the same.
Mr. JENNER - Was your mother loving and affectionate toward you boys?
Mr. PIC - I would say for myself, sir, I wasn't to her.
Mr. JENNER - What is that?
Mr. PIC - I was not toward her.
Mr. PIC - Yes; after they had left, that Marina's uncle, brother, some relation, was an officer in the
Russian Army. She had stated she had a relative in the Soviet armed forces.
Mr. JENNER - It was your impression that either Vada had or Robert had?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Some of the witnesses have testified that Lee was quick to anger as a boy. Do you
remember anything about that? What is your impression about that?
Mr. PIC - I don't remember, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Was he a considerate young man?
Mr. PIC - I think towards Robert and myself he was, sir. Towards other people, no.
Mr. JENNER - Was his attitude towards other people different from that which he had toward you and
Robert?
Mr. PIC - Yes; I believe so.
Mr. JENNER - In what respect--what did you notice about him in that regard?
Mr. PIC - He would rather play with us than play with other children, and he always wanted to go with us
wherever we went. Whenever we had a birthday or Christmas he would never forget us. I think he was
very considerate towards Robert and myself.
Mr. JENNER - From time to time we have been off the record and had some discussions in discussing
documents and other things. Do you recall anything we discussed off the record that you think is
pertinent here that I have failed to place on the record?
Mr. PIC - I don't remember what has been off the record, sir.
Mr. JENNER - I will put it this way then: Is there anything you would like to add at the moment now that I
am about to finish questioning you that you think you would like to have on the record?
Mr. PIC - If you are interested in my opinions-Mr. JENNER - Yes, sir; anything that you want to add.
Mr. PIC - I think, I believe that Lee Oswald did the crime that he is accused of. I think that anything he
may have done was aided with a little extra push from his mother in the living conditions that she
presented to him. I also think that his reason for leaving the Marine Corps is not true and accurate. I
mean I don't think he cared to get out of the Marine Corps to help his mother. He probably used this as
an excuse to get out and go to his defection.
I know myself I wouldn't have gotten out of the service because of her, and I am sure Robert wouldn't
either, and this makes me believe that Lee wouldn't have.
Mr. JENNER - What kind of a student was your brother. do you know, do you recall, rather?
Mr. PIC - I think in elementary school he was fairly good, sir.
Mr. JENNER - But then in the later grades, 7th 8th. 9th. 10th. and 11th?
Mr. PIC - I have no idea, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Well, that is about all. I sure appreciate your coming, and the Commission likewise, at
some inconvenience to yourself. You will be able to catch that 9:50 plane in the morning and get
yourself back to your son's birthday party.
Mr. PIC - I hope what I have told you has been something new and not repetitious.
Mr. JENNER - Much of what you have told us has been new. Much of what you have told us has been
very helpful to us in the way of corroborating matters about which we were not fully informed or in
doubt, and opinions have been expressed particularly with respect to your brother have been helpful.
That leads me to ask you this further question: Give me your overall impression of your brother Lee
Oswald as a personality, as he developed.
Mr. PIC - Sir; I remember Lee Oswald as a child, up until about the age of 11 or 12. To me, he appeared a
normal healthy robust boy who would get in fights and still have his serious moments.
Mr. JENNER - You got in fights, too, didn't you?
Mr. PIC - Sure.
Mr. JENNER - And your brother Robert?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - These are not fights that you would regard as other than boys getting into?
Mr. PIC - That is correct, sir.
Mr. JENNER - That is, it wasn't because he was unduly belligerent?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - All right. Go ahead.
Mr. PIC - He got in his usual trouble around the neighborhood as far as getting in people's yards,
probably, and letting the dog go astray, normal healthy boy.
I think as he became older, prior to me entering the service, he became slightly cocky and belligerent
toward his mother. He never showed any of this toward Robert or myself. I am afraid it probably rubbed
off of Robert and myself and it affected Lee, because we didn't really take much stock into what she was
saying. I don't think we were as cocky, as belligerent as he was. There was-Mr. JENNER - Do you think that was a defensive mechanism, on his part?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; I think so.
Mr. JENNER - Did your mother ever say anything around your home about that employers were
overreaching her, and employers overreached poor working people or anything along those lines?
Mr. PIC - No; she always reminded us she worked like a slave to provide for us three boys. She couldn't
wait for a day we would grow up and support her.
When Lee visited us in New York he came there a friendly, nice easy-to-like kid.
Mr. JENNER - This is 1952 in the summer?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir; he had the interest of boys at that age, the Museum of Natural History, sightseeing
excursions and so forth. Until the incident where I talked to him we never had a bad word between us
other than maybe joking or playing around. I tried to interest him in a hobby of building boats or
collecting stamps again while he was-Mr. JENNER - Had he been interested in those two hobbies?
Mr. PIC - Yes; he and I, all three of us collected stamps. I played chess with Lee quite a bit and Robert,
too. We all did this. Played monopoly together, the three of us.
When I approached him on this knife-pulling incident he became very hostile towards me. And he was
never the same again with me.
Mr. JENNER - That was the first time he had ever been hostile in that sense towards you?
Mr. PIC - Yes, sir.
Mr. JENNER - And that rupture was never repaired thereafter?
Mr. PIC - No, sir.
Mr. JENNER - Did you have the impression when you saw him on Thanksgiving of 1962 that in the
meantime he had become embittered, resentful of his station?
Mr. PIC - Well, sir; the Lee Harvey Oswald I met in November of 1962 was not the Lee Harvey Oswald I
had known 10 years previous. This person struck me as someone with a chip on his shoulder, who had
these purposes I mentioned, to do something about.
Mr. JENNER - What purposes?
Mr. PIC - To repay the Government and get his discharge changed.
It appeared to me that he was a good father towards his child, and not knowing the conversation
between he and his wife I couldn't form much of an opinion there.
Mr. JENNER - All right, sir; that is about it.
Mr. PIC - OK, sir; thank you very much.
Mr. JENNER - This transcript will be prepared by the reporters and it will be sent to your commanding
officer, and would you please get it immediately and read it and sign it. If you make any corrections in it,
put your initials beside the correction, or over, above, your initial somewhere around the correction so
we know it is you who did it, and return it to us as promptly as possible.
It may be that the Secret Service will bring it out, but it will be delivered to you next week